EDITORIAL SUSTAINS MARIJUANA MYTH

Your commentary on an Oakland court's ruling, allowing doctors to prescribe
marijuana where medically appropriate, dismayed me. I was expecting your
editorial to praise the increased freedom of a doctor to practice medicine.
Instead you chose to perpetuate the myth that the medical marijuana movement
is nothing more than a ploy to legalize recreational marijuana use. In fact,
a study conducted by the Center for Substance Abuse Research found that
medical marijuana initiatives passed in 1996 by California and Arizona did
not increase recreational marijuana use. Do you further believe the medical
use of the morphine is a ruse to legalize heroin?

You rhetorically ask, "Can't other drugs do this (reduce suffering) as well?
While there are other drugs available for many conditions, it's an
oversimplification to say that these synthetic alternatives are always
preferable to marijuana. Some people simply don't respond well to the
medications. The ruling even takes special care with its wording to prevent
abuses, specifying that the only people prescribed marijuana are "patients
who face eminent harm and have no effective legal alternative to marijuana."
Appropriately applied, the ruling will help many and hurt none. Your
prediction that doctors will prescribe this drug indiscriminately is
insulting to the medical profession.

You conclude by saying, "It (marijuana) does not serve any purpose as a
medical drug." If that was indeed true, why would the FDA approve the use of
Marinol, a synthetic form of marijuana, for treatment of AIDS wasting
syndrome and for relief of nausea and vomiting in chemotherapy patients?
Smoked marijuana is usually preferred over orally ingested Marinol because
it brings much quicker relief and there is no chance of vomiting back up the
medication.

Adam Meadows, Senior, Schools of Engineering

'POT FEAR' NEEDS TO BE EASED, ERASED

At least one editor on the staff of the Exponent is fervently against the
use of marijuana for medical purposes, fearing that it would promote the
eventual rampant spreading of this drug.

While I agree that many Californians are utilizing the (arguable) medicinal
benefits of marijuana as a front for its legal usage, I believe that
marijuana laws in California at least take a stab at easing the great "pot
fear" that exists in our country.

I, like many of readers of this article, am a recreational drug user.
Caffeine (daily usage) and alcohol (weekly usage) are two drugs that I use.
Do I or any other drug user have a right to criticize a law that gives
people access to marijuana, a drug whose long term usage effects are far
less drastic than those of alcohol? The Californian voters have shown that
basic moral behavior code still exists: Retrospectively judge our own
actions before we restrict those of others.

Brandon Eash, Senior, Schools of Engineering

READER NEEDS MARIJUANA FOR SEIZURES

Your July 19 editorial raises a fair question about medical marijuana: can't
other drugs do just as well? The answer is an emphatic no. I suffer from
seizure disorder and rely solely on cannabis to prevent seizures. The drugs
I would be prescribed legally are highly toxic, addictive and debilitating
narcotics such as Phenobarbital and Dilantin. Cannabis is clearly the
superior choice for its extremely low toxicity and non-addictive nature.
Very few, if any, pharmaceutical medications contain antioxidants, but
cannabis contains antioxidants "more powerful than vitamin E or vitamin C,"
according to Dr. Aiden Hampson of the National Institute of Mental Health.
This is in addition to its well documented neuro-protective,
anti-inflammatory and analgesic properties. Medical marijuana is a redundant
phrase. Cannabis has been a medicine for at least 5,000 years. Legalizing
cannabis completely would obviate the" higher risk of spreading an illegal
drug" you decry.

Larry Stevens, Illinois Resident

MARIJUANA HAS VALID MEDICAL USE

Wednesday's editorial on medicinal use of marijuana was obviously poorly
researched, if it was researched at all.

The author argued that a recreational drug should not be put to medical use
when there are other drugs that work just as well. I agree. But sometimes
there is no other drug as good. This is why we use opiates as painkillers.

But the most important medical use of marijuana is not to dull pain, as the
author seemed to think; it is to combat nausea and stimulate the appetite.
Sure, there are other drugs that do that, but none of them have had such a
profound effect on chemotherapy patients as marijuana. None of them have
actually allowed AIDS patients to gain back much needed weight but marijuana
has. It does have valid medical use, and it's about time someone in the
government decided to allow it.

Juno Farnsworth, Freshman, School of Consumer and Family Sciences