WASHINGTON (Reuter) U.S. antidrug czar Gen. Barry McCaffrey Wednesday
dodged lawmakers' calls to campaign against various state laws allowing the
medical use of marijuana, saying the American people must decide.

``At the end of the day, it seems to me ... (that we'll give them) the
scientific fact, and let the American people make up their own minds,''
McCaffrey told members of a House panel on crime.

Later, McCaffrey was blunt when asked whether he would travel to Florida,
Arkansas and other states to oppose socalled medical marijuana measures
that were expected to be placed on voters' ballots.

``I am not in charge of America,'' McCaffrey told Reuters. ''I'll provide
information for the debate, leaning heavily on the scientificmedical
community. I'll inform them of federal law. I'm not America's nanny. The
American people are perfectly capable, when they are exposed to the facts,
of making up their own mind.''

Eight states California, Arizona, Louisiana, Georgia, Virginia,
Connecticut, New Hampshire and Vermont have medical marijuana laws,
according to McCaffrey's office of National Drug Control Policy.

Five more states Alaska, Washington state, Arkansas, Florida and
Massachusetts plus Washington D.C., have such initiatives pending.

Dr. Lester Grinspoon of Harvard Medical School said in prepared testimony
that marijuana can be useful in treating the nausea often brought on by
cancer chemotherapy and can also be effective for patients with glaucoma,
seizures and chronic pain and AIDS weightloss syndrome.

Grinspoon likened the general rejection of marijuana's medical uses to
early suspicions about penicillin. Like penicillin, Grinspoon said in
prepared remarks, marijuana was nontoxic, inexpensive to produce and
extremely versatile.

McCaffrey said further studies were needed to determine marijuana's
effectiveness for medical purposes, and said the National Institutes of
Health and the U.S. Food and Drug Administration were performing these
studies.