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The Legalizing Of Marijuana Essay Research Paper

The Legalizing Of Marijuana Essay, Research Paper


The Legalizing of Marijuana


Recently, both California and Arizona took the long needed initiative


and approved the use of marijuana for medical purposes. The California bill


says that patients may use marijuana with a doctor’s recommendation. It does


not, however, allow doctors to prescribe the drug. Arizona voters passed a bill


that swings out even further to the left than California’s. Voters in Arizona


think that people should be able to use any illicit drug for bona fide medical


purposes. A recommendation by two doctors is enough to warrant a prescription.


Unfortunately, the bills passed in both states are terribly vague and are


destined to be abused.


Legalization of marijuana for medical purposes is a step in the right


direction, but California and Arizona are going about it the wrong way. The


chemical in marijuana that has medicinal benifits is delta-9-


tetrahydrocannabinol (THC). Studies have shown that marijuana can ease pain,


relieve nausea, and generally relax a person. Marijuana is cheap and easy to


produce, so if legalized, it would be plentiful and probably widely used. The


problem is that there are as many harmful effects from smoking marijuana as


there are benefits. It slows reflexes, dulls the brain, and sometimes causes


hallucinations and/or cancer. There’s no mystery about why it is illegal in


most parts of the world? including the U.S.


There is a simple solution that is not being discussed by the hard-


headed bureaucracy. THC is easily removed from the plant and could be


administered as medicine in pill form. What a novel idea! No? actually it


isn’t novel at all. Many other forms of illegal drugs are dispensed as medicine


is this manner. Steroids (Cortizone, Prednizone and others) and opiates, namely


codeine and morphine, are prescribed regularly to patients for pain relief. Of


course the doctors don’t dispense poppy seeds or cocaine, the drug comes in a


pill. The amount of the drug is carefully regulated to prevent most side


effects but to still have the medicinal qualities. THC would be j

ust as easy to


put in pill form, plus it has an important advantage over many other pain


relieving drugs; THC is not adictive. Abuse of Tylenol 3 with Codeine? is a


very rare occurrence, even though it can become addictive. Therefore, the abuse


of a doctor prescribed THC pill would be even less common.


The solution of putting THC in a pill has not been suggested before


because it doesn’t satisfy the ultimate goal of either side of the debate.


Those who are for legalization, such as Ethan Nadelman, the director of an


institute that promotes deregulation of illicit drugs, are using medicine as an


excuse to get marijuana legalized for recreational purposes. Those against


legalization know the motives of people like Nadelman and are worried that any


relaxation of the law will lead to more deregulation. The compromise of putting


THC in a pill should partially satisfy both extremes of the argument. It should


also eliminate concern that legalization of marijuana for medical purposes will


lead to the legalization of other illicit drugs. Marijuana would remain illegal


but THC could be legalized in a manner that makes it very hard to abuse. Those


who want marijuana legalized are using medicinal purposes as the backbone of


their argument. This is the medicine they asked for. The drug would be


available only by prescription, so it could be used only by people who


legitimately need it.


Why forgo a valuable medical resource because the abuse of that resource


is illegal? This type of ultra conservative thinking would eliminate most of


the medications on the market today. No more cough syrup, it has alcohol in it.


Robitussin? is out of the question. There are enough opiates in a bottle to


kill someone. Proponents of the legalization of marijuana are not really


arguing over the legalization of the drug as a medicine. They want marijuana to


be completely legalized. On the other hand, the status quo and red tape are


keeping a perfectly good medicine off the market. A little less convention and


a little more compromise would calm the uproar about legalization of marijuana.


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