POT LESS HARMFUL THAN MOST PRESCRIBED DRUGS

I would like to explain something to Jeanette McDougal (Letters, April 20)
about medical marijuana. First, as a 100 percent disabled Vietnam veteran, I
take a large number of Veterans Administration-prescribed drugs; all affect
my liver, and many will cause me great harm if I stop taking them.

For pain relief for the metal in my neck and knee, I take Oxycodone provided
by the VA. This drug is very addictive.

As for tar from the marijuana, last spring I was tested at the Fort Miley VA
center in San Francisco for sleep disorders. My lungs used 100 percent of
the oxygen I breathed in. It was the highest percentage the hospital had
recorded. I have smoked marijuana since 1969 when I was in the Air Force.

Of the medications that I take (heart, depression, thyroid and pain),
marijuana is the safest. No drug is risk-free, some are just less toxic to
the body, and marijuana is one of them. I am proof that marijuana is less
harmful than most.

George R. Quarles

Forestville, Calif.