MEDICAL MARIJUANA BAD MEDICINE AND BAD PUBLIC POLICY

An editorial calling for federal rescheduling of cannabis was
misguided and misinformed.

In regards to "Our View: While cannabis is illegal, dispensaries will
struggle" (Aug. 8), the suggestion that marijuana be reclassified to a
lower schedule, like prescription drugs, is misguided and misinformed.

Marijuana is a Schedule I drug, which reflects the facts that it is
widely abused, that it has no approved medical use by the Food and
Drug Administration, and that it lacks accepted safety for use under
medical supervision.

The latest National Survey on Drug Use and Health shows that more than
60 percent of all Americans age 12 and older classified with illicit
drug dependence or abuse in the past year were dependent on or abused
marijuana. Marijuana remains a significant drug of abuse.

Sound medical practice requires that medicines meet well-established
standards to determine that they are safe and effective before they
are approved for use by sick patients. This system includes the
requirement that medicines be approved by the FDA and be distributed
in a closed system to limit abuse and diversion.

Some of the chemicals in marijuana may one day be approved for the
treatment of specific disorders at specific doses within the
well-established system of drug approval. They could then be dispensed
by physicians' prescriptions in the controlled system that has served
this country well for a century.

Undermining that system, as "medical marijuana" does, is bad public
policy and bad medicine.