By Zack Steele
Last month, a bipartisan group of senators including presidential hopeful Rand Paul introduced a Senate bill to re-classify medicinal marijuana. Sounds ridiculous, right? But to many physicians and the scientific community, this proposal may change the way many doctors manage patient care.
To give you a little background, marijuana is classified as a schedule I narcotic. It’s right up there, according to the federal government, with heroin and LSD in terms of danger and potential benefit. Cocaine is considered schedule II along with many of the more abused pr Zack Steele[/caption]
Until recently, cannabis was considered a drug many used recreationally because of THC, the chemical compound that delivers a “high.” But only in the last few years have scientists begun to discover that other chemical substances, known as canniboids, are effective in helping with all other types of ailments. Children who suffer horrible seizure disorders who are treated with low to no THC and just the canniboid portion are having fewer seizures.
Doctors who treat Alzheimer’s syndrome are noticing that the plaques that develop in the brain that cause the disease are greatly reduced in patients treated with medicinal marijuana.
So why are we just finding this out now? Some 23 states have laws permitting medicinal cannabis. Before, no one was able to see clinical results or do research for fear of prosecution because of its drug schedule. Now, with laws relaxed and lifted in some cases, scientists are free to research and find new uses for medicinal marijuana.
One of the most appealing qualities is that the drug is much less addictive than many prescription drugs to treat these ailments. Prescription painkillers and many other medications are highly addictive with side effects. Marijuana tends to have very few of these qualities.
So why has it taken so long for us to find this out? Why now is marijuana becoming accepted as a viable medication when just 20 years ago it was taboo? There are many conspiracy theories out there about big pharmaceutical companies and lobbying dollars pushing politicians in the opposite direction. Law enforcement officials, they say, are against any changes due to the federal funding they receive to fight the drug war. I don’t know if any of that is true. I can say that if a person or group of people say the same thing often enough it is likely to become accepted as true. And let’s face it, up until now, the main group advocating marijuana legalization were recreational smokers. Now that there is actual science to back up anecdotal evidence, we have to research this further.
I got turned around on this a couple years ago, when reading about the many children who went from more than 100 seizures a day to 20, then to none. I think we all should open our minds and remember that not everything that we have been told about this drug is 100 percent true.
For the record, I’m not advocating at this time full legalization of another substance that can alter one’s mental state, but I am most definitely for changing the drug classification so that further research can be done, and helping those who really need help.
Dr. Zack Steele is a 2003 graduate of the UAB School of Optometry. His practice, Trussville Vision Care, is located on Chalkville Mountain Road in downtown Trussville.
