ALLOWING MEDICINAL MARIJUANA COULD LEAD TO A SLIPPERY SLOPE

Two bills have been introduced in the Illinois Legislature intending
to make legal the medicinal use of smoked marijuana. The companion
bills, called the Compassionate Use of Medical Cannabis Pilot
Program Act, have been filed in both the Illinois House and Senate
and are supported by a surprisingly large percentage of the
Democratic caucuses in both chambers.

Legislative members, however, have been misinformed by supporters
regarding both the effect the bills will have upon Illinois and the
long-term motivations of the bill's supporters. Lobbyists are making
no attempt to conceal their long-range goal for Illinois:
cannabis legalization.

The Illinois bill is similar to one that passed in California
several years ago. In northern California, marijuana has become the
most lucrative agricultural commodity in the region (surpassing
wine) and is known in California as the "cash crop." California is
fast overtaking Mexico as the exporter of the marijuana being
smuggled into the Midwestern and Eastern United States.

During the past year, more cannabis loads were interdicted along
Interstate 80 in Illinois originating from California than from
Mexico. Is Illinois poised to become the next supplier of marijuana
to the East Coast?

The law is nominally intended for terminally ill patients. In
California, 40 percent of medical marijuana patients are between 21
and 30 years old and not terminally ill. As the current legislation
is written, anyone complaining of chronic pain is eligible to
obtain a license.

Proponents of the bill claim that compounds in cannabis have
medicinal properties that ease the pain and suffering of certain
terminally ill patients. If so, then those chemical compounds should
be isolated and researched.

In the United States, there is a process for creating and vetting
medicines that should not be skipped with this particular chemical compound.

Several plant-based substances have been converted to medicines
(aspirin and morphine, for example), including opium plants. In no
medicinal prescription has smoking been determined to be the best
delivery system of the drug.

The American Medical Association also opposes smoking as a viable
delivery system.

Dr. Rafael Meshulam from Hebrew University has been conducting brain
injury research for more than 20 years. He has isolated compounds
from the cannabis sativa plant that experimentation has shown has
some promising medicinal qualities for trauma patients.

He has patented those medicines with injectable delivery systems,
and a large Israeli pharmaceutical company is working toward
commercializing the products.

When doctors prescribe any other drug, the dosage recommendation is
extremely specific.

There is a substantial difference, for example, between giving a
patient 30 milligrams or 10 grams of a particular drug. Marijuana's
THC content, on the other hand, can range by as much as 3 percent to
more than 30 percent. Is this a controlled medical drug?

This is not a road that Illinois wants to travel down. If there are
therapeutic benefits to compounds within the cannabis plant, let
them be extracted and delivered safely like every other medicine.