Medical Marijuana is a topic of much debate within the medical community as well as the state and national government policy makers. Even in most social circles, varying opinions on the subject can be found. The real question is what is the medical merit and is it really worse than smoking cigarettes or alcohol? I plan to educate those who read this on the history, medical use, and merits of legalization.
Medical marijuana has had a long, lengthy history of repeated use in the U. S. Initially, from 1900 to 1940, marijuana, as well as opium and cocaine were thought of as part of an array of everyday drugs. As the harmful and addictive effects of crack and opium, the U.S. outlawed ...view middle of the document...
(Armstrong, 2014). In 1964 Raphael Mechoulam with his colleague Yechiel Gaoni, discovered the chemical structure of THC that lead to scientific studies of the medicinal use of marijuana. (Mechoulam, 1983) It said to be used to relieve intestinal pain, constipation and female reproductive problems. Hua T’o, the first Chinese surgeon used is as an anesthetic for surgery in 110 A.D. (Ferner, 2013) With a better understanding of the chemical components marijuana became studied and publicized as a medical medicine beginning in 1965 and culminating in the 1970’s. (Johnson, 2001) This correlates to the rise in recreational use, coincidence, I think not. A rise in interest in, marijuana use as medicine, was renewed in the 1990’s as it was found to have neurologic uses to be used in correlation with epilepsy, insomnia, spasms, pain, glaucoma, asthma, and Tourette syndrome. With these studies, there was much more scientific knowledge and understanding of the effects as a recreational drug. (Zuardi, 2006)
The original state to permit the use of medicinal marijuana was California in 1996. (Zeese, 1999) The sole way of procuring medical marijuana is through the prescription from a certified doctor. Additional states started to trail in the footsteps of California as with the states of Arizona and Colorado. After the success of regulation and a blueprint for state legislation, there are now up to twenty states with legalized dissemination of Medical marijuana, and fourteen states with pending legislation as of this paper. (ProCon.org., 2013) A report from the National Center for Biotechnology Information shows that the amount of recreational use of marijuana has in states where medical marijuana laws are in effect by .53 percent and that there is not estimates of increased risk of illegal marijuana use. (Sam Harper, 2012)
Medical marijuana has never been acknowledged for the advantages it poses as a prescription drug. Many people just cast off marijuana as a bad drug. In contrast to today’s pharmaceuticals, marijuana may be seen as a radical drug for its natural, unique chemical compounds. There are natural hunger stimulants that can be used to help patients with diabetes and anorexia. This stimulant is what we call the munchies. This means, marijuana it then makes people get hungry by smoking or taking a pill version of marijuana, known as the munchies. (Razdan, 1986) Next, there is significant scientific research that concludes that tobacco products such as cigarettes and chewing tobacco negatively affect health more than the use of marijuana. Smoking tobacco not only has chemicals that hurt the lungs, as well as the mouth, with every type of tobacco product...