One month ago I traveled to California for an event in San Francisco. The morning before the event, I awoke to the news that the DEA was raiding Blue Sky, a dispensary in Oakland. It was heartening to see an outpouring of support for medical marijuana patients, but the dispensary was closed down and medicine was seized. The next day I visited a dear friend who is suffering from late-stage cancer, who is too ill to medicate even with a vaporizer. Though in great pain, my friend did not want to use morphine and lose her ability to communicate with the friends and family whom she loves very much.
Thanks to California's compassionate use law, I was quickly able to meet her caregiver at a dispensary in San Francisco, where he safely purchased cannabis edibles recommended by her doctor. Within an hour of taking a medical cannabis lozenge, my friend, who hadn't eaten in three days, sat up and ate like a horse. This sight reminded me why we all fight so hard for safe access. What would I have done if this were my grandmother in Texas, which does not permit compassionate use? How could I have quickly found edibles if the DEA had closed every dispensary in the Bay Area?
DEA actions jeopardize health, but we can stop the raids
When the federal government tries to stop access to medicine, they are trying to undo tens of thousands of hours work that advocates and local governments have put in to creating regulations for safe access to cannabis. The DEA wants to deny patients medicine that can dramatically improve their lives, or reduce their suffering. Without safe access to cannabis, patients and caregivers have to resort to the inconsistency of the illicit market.
That is why Congressmen Dana Rohrabacher, Maurice Hinchey and Sam Farr will introduced a bipartisan amendment to deny funding to DEA raids against dispensaries operating in accordance with state law. This amendment to an Appropriations bill would not legalize marijuana, but would preserve state's rights to allow compassionate use, and support local government decision-making.
If you do one thing for safe access to medical marijuana this year, make it a phone call to your representative in support of this important amendment by using our Online Action Center.
My friend is still alive. Marijuana will not reverse the course of her illness, but thanks to high-quality cannabis products, she is alert enough to talk to her friends and family for what may be the last time. Having those precious moments with a dear friend is why I work so hard to preserve access for all patients. Please join me in asking your representative to vote Yes on the Rohrabacher-Hinchey-Farr Amendment, to preserve safe access for our friends and loved ones.
Scott Morgan: Would Romney Be Worse for Medical Marijuana Than Obama?
Why are we still asking to be allowed to die without pain?
The people in power are evil monsters who should be in prison.
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Hi in Texas
Make all the "clinics' in LA, Oakland and Seattle real medical outlets and not "wink wink" Bodegas working on a pretense. Oh, and give Eureka back. Then maybe we'd believe you are serious about medical mj and not just looking for an easy score.
Otherwise, who wants you, and the crowd you attract in their neighborhood?
You would be doing a huge favor to those people you claim would benefit, by removing them from the ranks of criminals and putting them in the ranks of patients where they belong.
Grow up. Medicine is the world of adults and scientists. Also it is the 21C not the dark ages.
101 Peer-Reviewed Studies on Marijuana
Medical Studies Involving Cannabis and Cannabis Extracts (1990 - 2012)
http://stash.norml.org/first-us-clinical-trials-on-medical-marijuana-in-20-years-confirm-efficacy-in-humans
http://www.maps.org/research/mmj/
Cannabis was recognized as a medicine around the world until 1937 and remained a medicine sold across the counter until the FDA was created.
So now we are supposed to wait on the federal agency that took cannabis out of our medicine cabinets too proclaim that it is medicine,,,such hypocrisy.
Cannabis as a medicine is documented in Chinese medical papers for over 4000 years,,if you want proof,,or do you think the hippies snuck back in time and planted that info?
As a retired paramedic, who had dispensing authority for everything in the drug box on my own volition, aka, ‘standing orders’, (except for Valium, M.S., Demerol & vasopressors: Dopamine), I can categorically say a non-smoked cannabis-analogue would have been a God-Send!
Currently, I can remember where people went to obtain heroin, marihuana, ups, downs, sideways, (and the more-than-occasional, semi-automatic ‘attitude-modifier’ as well), during my decade of urban-patrol, and...
with the exception of a few changed doorways…they’re still there!
What's the current statistic?
If one imports / redistributes 100 tons of 'X' or 'Y', one can make reasonable businesses decisions, (re employee & police pilferage/confiscation, for resale, etc.), to the tune of an overhead-cost of 1 - 3%!
Given the black market's untaxed profit margin, there AIN'T no managing these problem(s) by ‘law enforcement’!
Perhaps I wouldn’t have seen / see so many tragedies, if AmeriKa wasn’t in a Golden Age of prison construction!