MEDICINAL MARIJUANA DEBATE OPENS IN LEGISLATURE

Doctors, Nurses Groups Disagree Over Drug's Therapeutic Benefits

Madison - The Capitol fight over whether to let critically ill people smoke
marijuana to fight pain and discomfort began Tuesday with physicians saying
"not yet," nurses saying "yes," and a wheelchair-bound Mondovi woman saying
smoking the illegal substance helps maintain her "quality of life."

The exchanges came as a state Assembly committee heard testimony from five
invited speakers who discussed smoking marijuana. Eight other states have
legalized marijuana for medical purposes, but Wisconsin would be the first
Midwest state to do so.

"I don't sit down and (smoke marijuana) to get high," insisted Jacki
Rickert, 49, of Mondovi, testifying in a whisper from her wheelchair. "I
can cut my medication in half if I'm able to use medicinal-strength cannabis."

With federal officials refusing to allow research on the medicinal smoking
of marijuana and not allowing pharmacists to fill prescriptions for the
substance, "I think it has to be a state issue," Rickert told members of
the state Assembly's State Affairs Committee.

"I'm looking to you people for help," Rickert added. She said she has two
critical illnesses affecting her tissue and bone marrow, and she tried
taking a legal prescription pill of THC, the active agent in marijuana, but
it made her very sick.

Rep. Rick Skindrud (R-Mount Horeb), committee chairman, said he agreed to
hold a by-invitation-only hearing Tuesday and doesn't know whether the move
to legalize the smoking of marijuana will ever be seriously considered in
the Legislature.

If there is no real support in the Legislature to legalize medicinal
marijuana, "What's the use of having a bill?" Skindrud added. Other
legislators questioned why Skindrud held a mini-hearing on an issue instead
of a formal bill, but Skindrud said the controversy deserved debate.

Rep. Frank Boyle (D-Superior) said Canada only days ago agreed to let that
nation's physicians prescribe marijuana for 20 specific diseases. Boyle
said he and Rep. Mark Pocan (D-Madison) will sponsor a bill patterned after
Hawaii's law to let Wisconsin physicians prescribe smoking the substance.

Limited To Prescriptions

Boyle insisted that he is not trying to legalize the recreational use of
marijuana. Instead, he said his bill would make it legal to smoke marijuana
only if a physician prescribes it.

A lung cancer survivor, Boyle said smoking marijuana to ease the pain and
discomfort of cancer or other critical illness should not be compared to
smoking cigarettes. "You're not going to smoke three packs of marijuana per
day," Boyle insisted.

Besides Hawaii, Boyle said Alaska, California, Colorado, Maine, Nevada,
Oregon and Washington have legalized the medical use and cultivation of
marijuana. In those states, and many foreign countries, the critically ill
often grow marijuana for their use or buy it from cooperative-like
organizations.

"It's a serious issue," Boyle added. He said marijuana was used to treat
illnesses like epilepsy, migraine headaches and other illnesses for
centuries until the United States banned it in the 1930s.

Two groups of medical professionals - physicians and nurses - disagreed on
whether the seriously ill should be allowed to smoke marijuana to help
control the effects of chemotherapy used to fight cancer, powerful
anti-AIDS drugs and other diseases.

"Marijuana is not a benign drug," said Michael M. Miller, a physician who
spoke on behalf of the State Medical Society of Wisconsin.

"Addiction to marijuana can and does occur," said Miller, an addiction
specialist for 18 years. "Dysfunction and disability do occur. Families can
be destroyed by cannabis addiction."

Increased Addiction Feared

Miller said "loosening controls" over smoking marijuana would result in
more of that activity and more marijuana addiction.

"Smoking marijuana is not medicine," said Miller, who said it would be
"foolish" and "dangerous" to let the seriously ill smoke marijuana before
more medical research on its medicinal value is completed.

"Wait until the science catches up," Miller asked the legislators.

But Gina Dennik-Champion, executive director of the Wisconsin Nurses
Association, said "there is medical research" to prove that smoking
marijuana helps the seriously ill, so the Legislature should let physicians
prescribe that substance.

Smoking marijuana can help "when other forms of treatment fail,"
Dennik-Champion said. She said it can be used for patients struggling with
glaucoma, nausea and vomiting resulting from cancer chemotherapy. It can
also be used to manage pain and to restore the appetite of critically ill
AIDS patients, she said.

Also, when someone who is ill smokes marijuana "the dosage can be
controlled," she added. "It is used therapeutically all throughout the world."

Dane County Sheriff Gary Hamblin, invited by Skindrud to give a law
enforcement perspective, said he personally thinks it is time for a
"intelligent discussion of the issue." Police officers are sympathetic to
ill patients fighting pain or the side effects of treatments for their
diseases, added Hamblin, who was recently treated for prostate cancer.

However, Hamblin said law enforcement professionals statewide probably
would not support the move to let Wisconsin physicians prescribe marijuana
smoking.

Legal Drug

States that allow the use and cultivation of marijuana for medicinal purposes:
Alaska
California
Colorado
Hawaii
Maine
Nevada
Oregon
Washington