MEDICINE OR GATEWAY DRUG?

Your May 18 editorial "Marijuana: Court had little choice, but
Congress can show mercy" was factually flawed.

Despite the lack of any scientific evidence to prove its point, the
editorial repeated the overused mantra of the pro-legalization
movement -- that medical marijuana provides "great relief to gravely,
mostly terminally ill patients suffering from AIDS, cancer and other
diseases."

The majority of the marijuana advocates' "evidence" comes from
unscientific, nonscrutinized anecdotal statistics from people with a
variety of illnesses.

Medical evidence contradicts the bold claims made in your editorial.
For example, according to the National Institute of Allergy and
Infectious Diseases, HIV-positive marijuana smokers progress to
full-blown AIDS twice as fast as nonsmokers and suffer an increased
incidence of bacterial pneumonia.

Medical experts, not Congress or voters, should make medical
decisions. The U.S. medical community has not closed the door on
marijuana or any other substance that may offer therapeutic benefits.
However, both law and common sense dictate that the process for
establishing substances as medicine be thorough and science-based.
Allowing marijuana or any other drug to bypass this process is unwise.

Time and time again, marijuana has been rejected as medicine by the
American Medical Society, the National Multiple Sclerosis Society, the
American Glaucoma Society, the American Cancer Society and the
National Cancer Institute.

James J. Halushka
Deputy Prosecutor-Warrants and Investigations
Oakland County, Pontiac