A MEDICAL MARIJUANA CASUALTY

The nation's DEA agents can sleep a little easier tonight. They now
have one less medical marijuana patient to worry about policing.

That's because Montana's leading medical marijuana patient-activist
took her own life last week, a direct result of DEA actions earlier
this year. Today, as the sad news spreads, every patient in the state
and all their relatives and friends grieve the loss of Robin Prosser.

It's time for our federal government to end its anti-scientific and
brutal war -- a war not on drugs, but on sick people like Robin.

For 22 years, Robin suffered the ravages of systemic lupus, a chronic
condition that causes the immune system to attack one's own organs
and tissues. For Robin, lupus meant a life of unrelenting pain and
diverse, horrific side-effects. She was allergic to most of the
prescription drugs her physicians tried. Only medical marijuana
brought her the relief and comfort that made living bearable.

In 2002, Robin made national news by conducting a hunger strike to
protest her inability to acquire and use marijuana legally. In 2004,
she played an active role in Montana's medical marijuana initiative
campaign, appearing in TV and radio ads and writing letters to
newspapers about the initiative's importance.

Also in 2004, she attempted suicide. She had run out of medical
marijuana and couldn't find any. Plunged again to the depths of her
body's physical and emotional misery, Robin preferred death to the
nightmare of ceaseless pain. Amazingly, Missoula police at the time
helped her doctor save her life -- and then promptly charged her with
the "crime" of possessing a pipe with some marijuana residue staining
its insides.

Several months later, 62 percent of Montanans -- the highest
percentage ever obtained in a public vote on the subject -- made
medical marijuana legal for patients like Robin. Today, people from
more than half the state's counties are legally registered patients
in the program, based on recommendations from 130 physicians.

But the overpowering strength of Montana's vote -- more than voted
for Bush, for our governor, for our congressman -- wasn't enough to
resolve Robin Prosser's predicament. While physician recommendations
are confidential and fully protected by law and by court decisions,
the federal government persists in its persecution of patients.
Earlier this year, the DEA intercepted a shipment of legal medicine
that was on its way to Robin. Since then, the living hell of her
body's condition reawakened, as many registered caregivers in Montana
became too afraid of the government to supply her with medicine.
Several began growing the strain of medical marijuana that worked
best for her, but it takes months of careful work to produce it --
time that Robin, in the end, couldn't endure.

This is a state's rights issue, and Montana voters deserve to have
their policy honored. This is also a science issue, and Americans
deserve a federal government that is intellectually honest enough to
acknowledge the existence of hundreds of scientific research reports
published in peer-reviewed professional journals over the last
several decades, documenting the remarkable medicinal effects of marijuana.

And we in Montana have a special axe to grind, even without Robin
Prosser's passing. That's because the only serious study of long-term
medicinal use of marijuana is commonly called "The Missoula Study,"
because its lead author happened to live in Missoula, Mont., at the
time it was conducted.

Dr. Ethan Russo is widely regarded as one of the world's leading
experts on cannabis (marijuana) and its use as medicine. His
"Missoula Study," published in 2002, reported on the experience of
patients who had received and used eight ounces of medical marijuana
every month since the 1980s. The patients got (and still get) their
monthly marijuana from -- are you ready for this? -- the federal
government, the same government that seized Robin Prosser's medicine.
Dr. Russo's research documented that medical marijuana relieved all
the patients' suffering better than "traditional" alternatives, and
allowed sharp reductions in their need for more expensive, riskier
drugs at the same time.

It's progress, at least, that all the Democratic presidential
candidates and two of the Republicans have gone on record promising
to end federal attacks on medical marijuana patients. And it's
important progress that Montana's Congressman Denny Rehberg has
supported this same position ever since his constituents adopted a
compassionate state policy.

But we've had enough tragedies. Let Robin Prosser be the last
casualty of the federal war on medical marijuana.