TRANSCRIPT: DR. CLAUDIA JENSEN - CANNABIS FOR ADD

COUNTDOWN is in the home stretch now. Your preview of our No. 1 story,
the war on drugs meets the war to get your kids' attention. Just say
no to ADD and give your kid pot? A doctor explains next.

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OLBERMANN: They are a diagnoses at near epidemic proportions for kids
in this country, ADD and ADHD, attention deficit disorder and
attention deficit hyperactivity disorder. Fair or not, they are so
common as to become part of the vernacular referring to our collective
short attention span and inability to focus. Don't mind him, he's got
ADD.

According to a member of the American Academy of Pediatrics, when our
nation's doctors encounter a patient with one of these disorders, they
go to right to one drug, methylphenidate. You may know it better as
Ritalin. But there is a lesser known treatment, one that may in fact
be more effective with fewer side effects, cannabis. You may know that
better as weed, reefer, Mary Jane, marijuana.

Dr. Claudia Jensen is a clinical instructor at the University of
Southern California and a practicing pediatrician who advocates the
use of medicinal marijuana for the treatment of ADD and ADHD.

Dr. Jensen, good evening.

DR. CLAUDIA JENSEN, MEDICAL MARIJUANA ADVOCATE: Hi. Hello. How are
you?

OLBERMANN: This is something you feel strongly about. You even
testified before Congress a few weeks ago an the use of medical
marijuana. What led you to the conclusion that this is a viable
treatment for this disorder?

JENSEN: Well, that is what patients reported to me, so I listened to
them. And I started paying attention and asking more questions when I
did patient interviews. It seems to be rather consistent. They keep
saying it over and over again.

OLBERMANN: There are parents who are no doubt thinking, as they watch
this, without any kind of analysis or any kind of medical explanation
or the expert testimony of a doctor who has listened to patients, that
this is that it makes no senses to them, the idea that they are
fighting on one front the influence, the pernicious influence of
marijuana in a teenager's life, a kid's life, and yet you are here
saying that this can be of enormous value in treating this rampant and
life-constricting disease.

How do you respond to people who have the knee-jerk reaction, how
could this possibly be any good?

JENSEN: Well, first of all, you're right. This is a potentially
life-debilitating condition for a lot of children and adolescents.
They become very angry.

And I think the answer to that question is that it needs to be
evaluated by a physician before it's recommended to a child or an
adolescent. And the truth is that one of the reasons that adolescents
have an increasing use of cannabis, marijuana, in this country is
because they've been lied to. They've been told that this is a very
dangerous drug and that it has no benefit. And, unfortunately, that's
not what they experience in the streets.

And I think it's more appropriate to bring it up out of the streets
and into the doctor's offices, so that children and adolescents and
parents can learn the truth, get some of the data, and look at this
drug not with a reefer madness perspective, but more with a scientific
and factual perspective.

OLBERMANN: How would you administer this to children, at what age? And
I'm presuming that the means of dispensing would be primarily those
other than smoking it, am I correct?

JENSEN: That's what I primarily recommend, particularly with ADD and
ADHD, because smoking marijuana has such a short duration. It only
lasts an hour and a half to two hours. Plus, there's the stigma of the
child smoking anything. But smoking pot is a difficult social issue to
deal with.

When they ingest those cannabinoids or cannabis compounds, for
example, marijuana, it lasts a lot longer. They can get all the way
through the day with a single cannabis cookie or piece of toast with
cannabis peanut butter in the morning before school. They don't have
to get stoned. It's dose-related. But they do get the benefit of being
able to focus and pay attention, not be impulsive, not be angry, be
peaceful and relaxed and pay attention in school, which helps them get
better grades, which is the important issue.

OLBERMANN: Anything would work.

Dr. Claudia Jensen from USC, many thanks for your time
tonight.

JENSEN: Thank you. Thank you for your time.

OLBERMANN: Certainly.