cannabisnews.com: Medical Marijuana Stories Shared





Medical Marijuana Stories Shared
Posted by CN Staff on October 20, 2003 at 10:19:53 PT
By Ben Fuchs, The Register-Guard
Source: Register-Guard
They tried everything, but nothing worked. They gave him medicine, which he threw up. They gave him food, which he also vomited. So they fed him through an IV tube in his arm, which made him stronger for a time. But Leif Place, suffering from a painful, incurable digestive disorder, still couldn't eat like other 13-year-olds. Desperate for a permanent solution after another extended hospital visit, Leif's mother asked his doctors for advice.
"They told me that if he didn't smoke marijuana, they didn't know if he'd ever eat again," said Sharon Place, 48. She had given her son a small dose once before as he was in the throes of another vomiting bout, which seemed to help ease his nausea and pain, but by that time Leif's recurring symptoms were so severe that he soon ended up in the hospital again. Now 17, Leif smokes marijuana every day to ease his symptoms so he can eat. His mother says the controversial drug saved her son's life. The boy's mother joined about 80 others at an office-warming party at Compassion Center's new clinic in west Eugene on Saturday. The clinic, which specializes in providing education and support and medical services to medical marijuana patients, was filled with volunteers, patients and supporters, who took tours of the new office, exchanged stories, and participated in a hemp cooking exhibition. While the atmosphere was light and upbeat throughout the afternoon, the occasion also allowed those in attendance, some of whom smoke marijuana legally through the Oregon Medical Marijuana Act, to sound off about federal regulation of the drug. "It's time for a change," said Eileen Erdelt, a coordinator for the Lane County Cannabis Initiative. The initiative, which needs about 9,000 signatures to make it onto next year's ballot, would forbid the county's sheriff's and district attorney's offices from spending general fund money on enforcement, arrests, prosecutions and county jail time for adult marijuana users. In addition, the initiative would prevent local authorities from cooperating with federal raids on medical marijuana patients and caregivers. Erdelt and other medical marijuana advocates are upset that the federal government can seize plants from and issue citations to state-licensed medical marijuana caregivers. Sharon Place is especially passionate about the subject. In addition to Leif, who became Oregon's youngest medical marijuana cardholder at age 13 in 1998, she has another son - also a cardholder - with a milder disorder. And Sharon herself is a patient. Afflicted with a similar, but less severe, digestive disorder than Leif's, she has used marijuana to cope with stomach pain since her teenage years in Los Angeles. So when she watched 12-year-old Leif lose 20 pounds in a three-week period in August 1998, Sharon became frustrated. Six visits to the hospital during this period had done little to improve his condition, and his incessant vomiting aggravated his stomach pain. Leif, the youngest of three boys, spent two years traveling to Doernbecher Children's Hospital in Portland and endured several lengthy hospital stays in Eugene. After years of costly medical care, which continues today, the best medicine turned out to be marijuana. "If he doesn't have it that day, he doesn't eat," she said. Though he takes 12 pills a day, still fights pain and struggles at times to maintain an appetite, Leif is a completely different person than the boy with the tube in his arm four years ago, Sharon said. Though she appreciates that she can legally grow and consume marijuana in Oregon, one of nine states that has adopted a medical marijuana law, Sharon said the medical marijuana act has too many loopholes. One objection she has is with the amount cardholders are allowed to possess. The law allows a person with a medical marijuana card to possess 3 ounces of the drug. She was jailed this year for possessing about 20 pounds of marijuana plants that she had grown. Others, like Erdelt, the LCCI coordinator, pointed to one recent political victory. On Tuesday the U.S. Supreme Court declined the Bush administration's request to consider whether the federal government can punish doctors for recommending marijuana to sick patients. "I think doctors will start listening and stop fearing the government so much," she said. Doctors had been wary of signing slips enabling patients to obtain medical marijuana, Compassion Center executive director Todd Dalotto said. He said the Supreme Court's ruling would likely clear the way for prospective patients to receive medical marijuana more easily. Source: Register-Guard, The (OR)Author:  Ben Fuchs, The Register-GuardPublished: October 19, 2003Copyright: 2003 The Register-GuardContact: rgletters guardnet.comWebsite: http://www.registerguard.com/Related Articles & Web Sites:SOMM-NEThttp://www.somm-net.org/Hemp & Cannabis Foundationhttp://www.thc-foundation.org/Let Fed Quit Fighting Oregon Over Marijuanahttp://cannabisnews.com/news/thread17617.shtmlCourt's Marijuana Ruling May Impact Oregonhttp://cannabisnews.com/news/thread17582.shtmlMedical Pot Gardens On Rise in Southern Oregonhttp://cannabisnews.com/news/thread17302.shtml
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Comment #8 posted by ekim on October 21, 2003 at 06:51:42 PT
interview on Thursday nite at 7pm
www.widr.org ---Peoples power hour. FoM the interview is being done today and aired on Thurs. 
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Comment #7 posted by FoM on October 20, 2003 at 21:17:06 PT
ekim
I like Gary. He is a good person in my book. What time will Barney Frank be on the radio tomorrow?
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Comment #6 posted by ekim on October 20, 2003 at 21:11:36 PT
Thank you FoM the newshawk was Garry 
http://www.mapinc.org/letters/2003/02/lte221.html
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Comment #5 posted by FoM on October 20, 2003 at 20:51:11 PT
ekim does this help?
http://www.norml.org/index.cfm?wtm_view=&Group_ID=4575
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Comment #4 posted by FoM on October 20, 2003 at 20:43:36 PT
ekim
I'm not sure I understand your question. I don't know where to look. 
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Comment #3 posted by ekim on October 20, 2003 at 20:34:31 PT
FoM will you post some info on Fed Med bills
Barney Frank is doing interviews tomarrow nite he will talk to WIDR raido 89.1 fm raido evolution from WMU in Kalamazoo. with 80 % for the law to be chanaged --surly more lawmakers will stand up for those 80%. see how many are standing. Hey E how many of Barneys fellow mates need to stand with him to have it pass. there is a Sen race in AK it seems that this issue will be kept low key but a Sen here and a Sen there soon you have the 80%. 
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Comment #2 posted by mayan on October 20, 2003 at 17:37:33 PT
The "Schedule One Lie"
"Doctors had been wary of signing slips enabling patients to obtain medical marijuana, Compassion Center executive director Todd Dalotto said. He said the Supreme Court's ruling would likely clear the way for prospective patients to receive medical marijuana more easily."Cannabis will soon be the most widely recommended medicine in the U.S. and Canada. The cannabis plant, thanks to the truth, is rapidly erasing years of demonization. The "schedule one lie" is being seen for what it really is!The way out is the way in...FBI: Moussaoui not involved in 9/11!
http://news.globalfreepress.com/article.pl?sid=03/10/20/04222589/11 CitizensWatch Applauds Commission’s First Subpoena:
http://www.911citizenswatch.org/modules.php?op=modload&name=News&file=article&sid=29&mode=thread&order=0&thold=0Questions on US Intelligence and Terrorism:
http://www.911citizenswatch.org/modules.php?op=modload&name=News&file=article&sid=30&mode=thread&order=0&thold=0The 9/11 Black Boxes 'Did Not Survive':
http://www.themedianews.com/DAGGER/Front%20Page/9-11_black_boxes_.htm9/11 - Status of the Investigations:
http://www.scoop.co.nz/mason/archive/scoop/stories/01/16/200310141135.091828ba.htmlBEYOND BUSH II - by Michael C. Ruppert:
http://www.fromthewilderness.com/free/ww3/102003_beyond_bush_2.html
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Comment #1 posted by Virgil on October 20, 2003 at 11:59:08 PT
This is your government brain on the treason drug
Screw his life. Screw his pursuit of happiness. Screw his liberty. We must lock the bastard up for breaking the law we enforce as a description of our jobs.We will protect (the plutocracy) and let him serve.We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.--That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed, --That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness. Prudence, indeed, will dictate that Governments long established should not be changed for light and transient causes; and accordingly all experience hath shewn, that mankind are more disposed to suffer, while evils are sufferable, than to right themselves by abolishing the forms to which they are accustomed. But when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same Object evinces a design to reduce them under absolute Despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such Government, and to provide new Guards for their future security.--Such has been the patient sufferance of these Colonies; and such is now the necessity which constrains them to alter their former Systems of Government. The history of the present King of Great Britain is a history of repeated injuries and usurpations, all having in direct object the establishment of an absolute Tyranny over these States. To prove this, let Facts be submitted to a candid world.
The Declaration of Independence
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