WHO'S PUSHING GRASS NOW?

Re Health Canada to study marijuana as painkiller.

Health Canada's insistence on studying marijuana's painkilling potential is
suspicious, given the recent announcement from a study published in the
British Medical Journal. It found that cannabinoids - cannabis in pill or
injectable form - are no more effective than traditional painkillers.

A second group of researchers reported that even when cannabinoids work
effectively, such as in controlling the nausea and vomiting related to
chemotherapy, they have potentially serious side-effects that should limit
their use.

Common sense tells us that no medication should be administered through
smoking. There is no way to control quantity, quality or the harmful
effects of other chemicals inhaled at the same time.

My 18 years' experience working in the substance-abuse field taught me to
be very suspicious of the forces driving research and government support of
issues. Could it be that interests controlling drug- laundering money are
the real force behind this insistence that marijuana has painkilling potential?

Karl N. Burden
Markham, Ont.