Should Marijuana be Legalized for Medical Purposes
Marijuana has been used extensively as a medical remedy for more than five thousand years. In the early 1900s, medical usage of marijuana began to decline with the advent of alternative drugs. Injectable opiates and synthetic drugs such as aspirin and barbiturates began to replace marijuana as the physicians drug of choice in the twentieth-century, as their results proved to be more consistent than the sometimes erratic effects of the hard-to-dose potencies of marijuana (Grinspoon, p. ... The Marijuana Tax Act of 1937 made cannabis so expensive to obtain that its usage as a medical remedy in the U. ... , marijuana continues to be used for both medical and recreational purposes by many Americans. There are a variety of opinions both for and against the re-legalization of marijuana today. Perhaps the most controversial aspect of the legalization debate is whether marijuana should be legalized for medical purposes. There are physicians both for and against the medical legalization of marijuana, the DEA enforces the laws. ... Claim V of these publications is entitled “There are no Compelling Reasons to Prescribe Marijuana or Heroin to sick people”. ... The DEA claims “Not one American health association accepts Marijuana as medicine. ... However, in reading the DEAs claim, one must keep in mind that “drugs” (as they use it) include both marijuana and heroin, and therefore may be partially invalid when applied to the central marijuana debate. By using the word “they” the DEA groups marijuana with more dangerous drugs. It should also be recognized that the DEA has an obvious bias against legalizing drugs; if all drugs were legal, who would continue to pay their salaries? ... A drugs scheduling under federal law is determined “according to its effects, medical uses, and potential for abuse” (Claim V, p. ... In this classification system, marijuana is a Schedule I drug, grouped with heroin, LSD, hashish, methaqualone, and designer drugs. ... A closer analysis of the DEAs Federal Scheduling System reveals that, according to various studies by physicians on both sides of the legalization debate, marijuana does not meet the requirements of a Schedule I drug, but not those of Schedule II. ... Proponents of legalization cite information that indicates marijuana is a relatively “safe” drug. ... Even some opponents of marijuana legalization support reclassification. Two physicians, in a widely distributed opinions piece entitled “Marijuana Smoking as Medicine: A Cruel Hoax”, wrote, “While the reclassification of THC to Schedule II might be understandable, this would not be the result of smoking the crude drug marijuana, which would as a result become more available and more readily diverted for non-medical use” (Nahas, p.