RICKJOHNSON's Blog

What do you think? Do you think, or does someone do it for you?

A major move by one of the nation's top medical groups, they are backing medical marijuana and they want the federal government to leave doctors alone.

(WASHINGTON, D.C. ) - In a unanimous vote, the Assembly of the American Psychiatric Association has approved a strongly worded statement supporting legal protection for patients using medical marijuana with their doctor's recommendation.

"This is a very large and important medical organization, it isn't some fringe group," said Bruce Mirken from the Marijuana Policy Project.

He told Salem-News.com, "This move debunks a lot of the nonsense from some of the anti-medical marijuana groups. They have been aggressively using false information tactics. These groups allege that there are various links between mental illness and marijuana, ignoring the fact that it is well documented that medical marijuana can be therapeutic".

The APA action paper, which must be approved by the APA Board of Trustees when it meets in December, notes that 12 states now have medical marijuana laws, and states, "The threat of arrest by federal agents, however, still exists. Seriously ill patients living in these states with medical marijuana recommendations from their doctors should not be subjected to the threat of punitive federal prosecution for merely attempting to alleviate the chronic pain, side effects, or symptoms associated with their conditions or resulting from their overall treatment regimens. ... [We] support protection for patients and physicians participating in state approved medical marijuana programs."

This is not the first, but the second action paper calling on the government to facilitate "well-designed clinical research into the medical utility of marijuana" were adopted Saturday with no dissenting votes by the APA Assembly, which represents the group's 74 district branches and 16 allied professional organizations.

"This vote is a landmark, and a proud day for our profession." said Abraham L. Halpern, M.D., professor emeritus of psychiatry at New York Medical College and past president of the American Academy of Psychiatry and the Law. "As physicians, we cannot abide our patients being subject to arrest and jail for using a physician-recommended treatment that clearly relieves suffering for many who are not helped by conventional treatments."

"This unanimous vote shows the growing acceptance of medical marijuana by organized medicine," said Rob Kampia, executive director of the Marijuana Policy Project in Washington, D.C. "Members of Congress who have opposed efforts to protect patients from federal prosecution have tried to portray medical marijuana as a fringe issue. But the APA Assembly vote, along with other recent endorsements including the Leukemia and Lymphoma Society, shows that it's those who want to arrest the sick and suffering who are on the fringe."

With 40,000 members and 16 allied organizations (including the American Academy of Psychiatry and the Law, American Academy of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry, American Association for Social Psychiatry, American Academy of Addiction Psychiatry, and the American Association of Emergency Psychiatrists), the American Psychiatric Association is the main professional organization for psychiatrists in the United States.

Mirken says the the Assembly of the American Psychiatric Association's trustees will vote on the matter in December.

With more than 23,000 members and 100,000 e-mail subscribers nationwide, the Marijuana Policy Project is the largest marijuana policy reform organization in the United States. MPP believes that the best way to minimize the harm associated with marijuana is to regulate marijuana in a manner similar to alcohol. For more information, please visit MarijuanaPolicy.org.

Source: Salem-News.com

Take the jobs away from "Employees of Marijuana Prohibition," or "Modern Day Bootleggers!" They are known as drug dealers. They will sell marijuana to your kids, will a responsible doctor? Marijuana Prohibition laws are going on 71 years, haven't we shot ourselves in the foot long enough? Doctors should be allowed whatever medication they feel as a professional, is the safest and best medication. Idiots that use marijuana in public, or give it to children, should be fined or charged along the same guidelines as alcohol and tobacco. Whether you use it or not, you pay for it! That is right you, the one reading this. The government uses over $7.7 billion, yeah billion, not million annually to fight marijuana with your tax dollars, so you should care. In 2006 over 800,000 people were arrested for marijuana, and 9 out of 10 were for simple possession, not dealing or manufacturing. We are putting non-violent pot heads in jail longer than we are violent criminals and waste of DNA pedophiles? It should be the other way around! If you don't like taxes, and I don't know many people that do, then you might want to accept the fact that pot smokers will never go away, so cash in! Tax and regulate, it makes sense, it doesn't mean go get high, it means save your tax dollars and go after real criminals, unless you like drug dealers selling to your children?

"According to estimates by Harvard University economist Jeffrey Miron, replacing marijuana prohibition with a system of taxation and regulation would save between $10 billion and $14 billion per year in reduced government spending and and increased tax revenue."

Miron, Jeffrey L., The Budgetary Implications of Marijuana. June 2005

Tobacco kills almost 450,000 people every year, alcohol kills almost 100,000 people every year. There is not a single case of death from direct use of marijuana,fact! You can ask my buddy Dr. Lester Grinspoon M.D. Professor Emeritus, Harvard Medical School. There are no deaths, you can not find one case! More people die from legal drugs annually, than all illegal drugs combined. Is putting tax paying non-violent offenders in jail, and releasing violent offenders like drug dealers who don't pay taxes, and sex criminals out for a second chance backwards? Well I think it is, but I think, do you?