MARIJUANA'S NOT JUST FOR HIPPIES ANYMORE

Murphy Brown tried it, Margaret Trudeau did it and U.S. President Bill
Clinton admitted to it, although he said he didn't inhale.

The ongoing debate about marijuana, that noxious weed often associated
with free sex and a liberal hippie lifestyle, is being teased with the
prospect of respectability. That is, if several groups across North America
and the Caribbean win their fight to legitimize the drug for medical
reasons.

California and Arizona passed ballot propositions one year ago this month
allowing the medical use of marijuana on a doctor's advice. But now there
is heated debate in these states about whether doctors should be allowed to
"intentionally" help their patients to obtain the stuff.

Governments and lawmakers can't have it both ways. They must decide what
limits they will impose and if they deem one dangerous substance legal
(like alcohol and cigarettes), then on what grounds do they decide a
substance like marijuana is illegal?

While I don't condone the use of any drug which is harmful or induces
mindaltering effects, the issue of marijuana's use, medical or otherwise,
smacks of hypocrisy. You have to wonder if all this has to do with the
money governments and big businesses make on substances they can control.

While there is no supporting evidence that alcohol and cigarettes are
beneficial to good health, in fact quite the opposite smoking is the
cause of the majority of lung cancer deaths these substances are
considered socially acceptable (well, cigarette smoking less and less so)
and legal.

Doctors have testified there is no scientific study to show that the use
of marijuana is detrimental to a person's health or leads to the use of
stronger drugs. Research and tests indicate that chemotherapy patients have
benefited from the use of marijuana's antinauseous properties and AIDS
patients have also reported benefits from its use.

Certainly the biggest evidence comes from the use of eye drops made from
the marijuana plant in the treatment of glaucoma, which is the leading
cause of preventable blindness.

In specific cases, like that of Terry Parker, an Ontario man who is a
chronic epileptic and has been using marijuana to fight his seizures, two
Canadian courts have accepted his marijuana use as medically necessary. But
that does not prevent him from being arrested for possession he was back
in court last month arguing it was unconstitutional to restrict him from
possessing and producing the drug if it is a medical benefit to him.

The court heard from expert witnesses, including Dr. John Paul Morgan,
professor of pharmacology at City University of New York Medical School,
who testified that marijuana was safer and more effective than the drugs
taken for epilepsy.

So where does this leave us? The double standard in this issue is
difficult to accept, particularly when the side effects and longterm
consequences of many legal prescription drugs can be so devastating.
Morphine, the highly addictive narcotic derivative of opium used in the
control of pain in hospitals, is strictly regulated but legal. So why not
enforce the same conditions with marijuana which is far less dangerous?

The dissenters are among those who worry that legitimizing the drug will
see a dramatic increase in its use among young people (as occurred in the
1960s and 1970s). An Addiction Research Foundation (ARF) study released
earlier this year indicated that although marijuana use among students
almost doubled between 1993 and 1995, preliminary results from this year's
survey showed there was no further increase in usage. The Ontario Student
Drug Use Survey found drug use among Ontario students today is much lower
than it was in the 1970s. Dr. Jessica Warner, the ARF scientist who led the
study, said most students told them they regarded recreational use of
marijuana as the norm.

Researchers concluded that marijuana does not have the same symbolic
meaning of rebelliousness for them as it did in their parents' youth. Now
that we have all grown up, let's stop waffling and make mature,
compassionate and experienced decisions about our health and how best to
take care of it.

Scala is Canadian editor of the Jamaican Weekly Gleaner.

Copyright (c) 1997, Canoe Limited Partnership.