Реферат: The Need To Legalize Pot Essay Research

The Need To Legalize Pot Essay, Research Paper

The Need To Legalize Pot

Just in, California has become the first state to legalize pot!

Unfortunately, for all you proud owners of a two-foot-bong or a three-inch bowl,

you must have a prescription from a medical doctor before you light up. Perhaps

it’s only a crack in the ice, but it is a start to a long-awaited, controversial

issue that needs to be touched upon again.

In the fall of 1996, Proposition 215 was passed in California,

legalizing the medical use of marijuana. Even though the majority (56%) voted

to pass 215, opponents plan to continue to fight the measure. It was also so in

Arizona, where Proposition 200, the Drug Medicalization, Prevention, and Control

Act, won 65% of the vote. It says that Arizona’s doctors can prescribe

marijuana, heroin, and LSD for patients when there is “medicinal value”

(California 62). The passing of these two propositions has also helped the

release of prisoners convicted of drug possession (—). With jail capacity

already overflowing, if you were to lock up a dealer, you therefore create a job

opening.

Bob Randall, president of the Alliance for the Cannabis Therapeutics, a

Washington-based patients’ right group, says as many as five-million sick

Americans might benefit from the legal access to marijuana. Marijuana has been

found to: relieve nausea and stimulate appetite in people with cancer and AIDS,

control muscle spasms among people with multiple sclerosis and other

neurological disorder, reduce eye pressure among people with glaucoma, and some

say it also controls seizures, eases chronic pain, and relieves depression. Dr.

Ernest Rosenbaum, a San Francisco cancer specialist, says he and many doctors

quietly recommend marijuana to patients who didn’t respond to other medications.

A 1991 Harvard study found that about 40 % of cancer specialists surveyed had

recommended marijuana to relieve chemotherapy nausea, and about 48% said they

would prescribe the drug if it were made legal.

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