GOVERNMENT IS STICKING TO FALSE INFORMATION ABOUT MARIJUANA

The editorial, "Marijuana is not the only pain reliever" (CT. Feb. 21)
misses the point.

In fact, the lawsuit filed Feb. 21 by Americans for Safe Access has it
exactly right: The information the federal government has been
disseminating about medical marijuana is false, misleading and
inaccurate, and thus in violation of the Data Quality Act.

The recent study published by University of California researchers
showing that marijuana effectively relieved disabling nerve pain in
HIV/AIDS patients is just the latest in a long chain of evidence that
goes back literally for millennia.

In 1988, Drug Enforcement Administration Administrative Law Judge
Francis L. Young - after a year's worth of hearings and a volume of
evidence so massive that the transcripts fill 15 volumes - ruled, "The
evidence in this record clearly shows that marijuana has been accepted
as capable of relieving the distress of great numbers of very ill
people, and doing so with safety under medical supervision."

Political appointees overruled Young and the lie that marijuana has no
medical value continued. It's time for our government to start telling
the truth.

Sincerely,

Bruce Mirken

Director of Communications

Marijuana Policy Project

Washington, DC.