Let doctors decide treatments

Suppose your dearest loved one was diagnosed with cancer and you watched
helplessly as they braved the horrors of chemotherapy. The battery of
available medications to fight the brutal nausea and pain either zonked
them out or had other debilitating side effects. In their struggle for
survival they try the illegal drug marijuana and discover nearinstant
relief from their symptoms.

Knowing this, would you feel a greater responsibility to loved one or
state? As their link to the world, it is your desire to keep them alive to
battle their disease. As a citizen, it is your duty to have them arrested
for breaking a drug law.

Obviously, few compassionate souls would make the latter choice, but
thousands of people must daily risk imprisonment, loss of home, child
custody, and indignity to acquire potentially lifesaving medicines.

Initiative 685 would allow doctors and patients a legal means to utilize
drugs that politicians have decided have no medical value. Allow trained
doctors, not politicians, to decide what is the most effective treatment
for you and your loved ones. End the arbitrary criminalization of your
fellow citizens.

Kevin Nelson
Bow, WA