SEEING THROUGH THE HAZE OF MEDICAL MARIJUANA

Proven scientific processes, not the ballot box, should determine what
drugs can be used to treat our ills

On Election Day, residents of Nevada will be asked to vote on marijuana.
The state ballot features a referendum that would legalize cultivation,
distribution, possession and consumption of marijuana ostensibly for
medical purposes. We should all seek safe and effective medicine to treat
medical ills, but our collective interest is better served when proven
scientific processes minister to disease -- not the ballot box.

The Nevada pro-pot amendment is a lead-in to drug legalization. This
amendment does not represent the grass-roots sentiments of Nevadans. It is
part of a stealthy national movement, bankrolled by well-known pro-drug
groups that have provoked similar measures in Alaska, Arizona, Colorado,
Oregon, Washington state, and the nation's capital. Advocates of drug
legalization have admitted that they couched the marijuana question in
medical terms to camouflage the issue.

We can't afford to send the wrong message to our children about marijuana
or other illegal drugs. Juvenile marijuana usage rates have skyrocketed in
the past six years. Kids now begin smoking pot in the sixth and seventh
grades. Half of today's teens do so before completing high school. Many
will suffer from decisions made while their judgment is impaired by the
psychoactive effects of this drug. Indeed, marijuana is now the second
leading cause of car crashes among young people (after alcohol). If we
lower the societal barriers further, then marijuana use among youth surely
will escalate along with the negative consequences of drug abuse. This was
Alaska's experience after a pro-pot ruling essentially decriminalized the
drug in the 1970s.

A leading medical journal recently warned readers about the risks posed by
unscientific medicine. This journal outlined how American health has
benefited from remedies whose safety and efficacy have been validated by
statistically reliable evidence and randomized, controlled clinical
studies. Arbitrary dosages, contaminated ingredients, and harmful or deadly
components largely have been eliminated from American medicine. This
marijuana referendum would turn its back on such progress and return us to
the medical dark ages when leeches were used to suck blood from sick
patients. There is no sense in subverting the scientific process for
assessing, testing and approving medications by resorting to a non-medical,
political process.

If pot were such a wonderful medicine, why haven't more doctors prescribed
Marinol -- the real "medical marijuana?" The active ingredient in the
cannabis leaf, THC, is synthesized in measured dosages as Marinol, a
prescription drug that has been available for 15 years. The FDA has
encouraged the pharmaceutical industry to develop other methods for
administering THC -- for example, by patch, suppository or inhaler. Such
developments may make it easier for more individuals to realize the
possible therapeutic benefits of THC under controlled, prescribed conditions.

Any purported medicine smoked in unmeasured amounts and unknown purity is
suspect. No one argues that people should eat moldy bread instead of taking
a penicillin capsule. Pills are cleaner, safer and more efficacious than
smoke. Crude marijuana, unlike Marinol, contains a host of tars and other
dangerous substances that have no therapeutic value. If components of
marijuana other than THC are found to be medically valuable, the current
scientific process will approve those components for safe use.

Nevada doesn't need wholesale experimenting with dangerous home remedies.
We should avoid sham "medicine" that provides cover for widespread
trafficking in illegal drugs. Now is the time for concerned citizens to say
"yes" to their communities, their children and themselves by voting "no" on
this pro-drug referendum. It's better to be safe than sorry.

Checked-by: Mike Gogulski