Is Maryland the 19th Medical Marijuana State?

This morning across my Facebook News Feed came an article by MarijuanaDoctors.com titled "Maryland Becomes 19th Medical Marijuana State. My initial reaction was, "Say what!" I have been at this in Maryland in 2007. I have been there to testify at every chance. I for one do not consider myself now living in a medical marijuana state.

Why is that you might ask. Well because for one this law depends on teaching hospitals willing to step up and create a research program studying the efficacy of cannabis as medicine. Sorry but that ship sailed about 5,000 years ago when cannabis was first used as an analgesic and continued to be medicine up until the Thirties. Back then you could go into your local pharmacy and find over the counter cannabis oils and tinctures. Then as we all know William Randolph Hearst, the DuPont Family, and our favorite bureaucrat Harry Anslinger decided marijuana was evil and with their considerable resources had marijuana declared illegal.

No further research is needed as to the general efficacy of cannabis as an effective medicine. What is needed is studies as to which strain works best for which ailment. For those studies to be most beneficial we need as many patients as possible to have access.

Secondly, as MarijuanaDoctors.com points out the two major teaching hospitals Johns Hopkins & the University of Maryland Medical Center have declined to participate at this time. But even if a teaching hospital does decide to participate it is they who will control who gets to be included in their research. Research studies by necessity are limited therefor they will control how many Maryland patients get the medicine we desperately need.

I have now spoken to the four major marijuana reform organizations, NORML, Drug Policy Alliance, Americans for Safe Access, and Marijuana policy project. They are all in agreement. This is a step forward but only a baby step. Therefor none of the aforementioned organizations will be adding marijuana to their list of medical marijuana states, their number holds at eighteen plus the District of Columbia.

As a Marylander, a patient, and as an activist I can assure you I and others will be back in Annapolis come January 2014 to tell the Maryland General Assembly it is time to get it right. It is time to pass a strong, inclusive medical marijuana bill and do so with a veto proof majority. This would force Gov. Martin O'Malley to sign it or have his legislative record take a major hit. In 2007 I was told by lobbyists and lawmakers alike that Gov. O'Malley would sign our bill which was modeled after the Rhodes Island law. That bill failed to even be called for a vote in the House of Delegates Judiciary Committee and died.

Last year nearly the same bill failed because the Governor was afraid of some conservative federal prosecutor who were acting in conflict to Attorney General Holder's position of not prosecuting people acting in accordance with their state law when it comes to medicinal marijuana. Thus torpedoing last years attempt and forcing me and many other seriously ill patients to come back again to fight for rights. The right to not die because you're too weak from not eating. The right be able to control the muscle spasms of Cerebral Palsy & MS. And my personal favorite the right to be as pain free as possible.

So MarijuanaDoctors.com may consider Maryland a medical marijuana state but I don't and none of the activists I know personally do. Sorry Marijuana Docs you're on your own on this one.

Insight on disABILITY

Last Sunday evening I was a guest on Insight on disABILITY which airs on WCBM 680 on the AM dial, Sunday evenings at 7PM. The show hosted by Joe Buccheri along with his cohorts I mean cohosts Michael Gerlach, Lou Bottoen, & Zoey Robinson-Budreski. Each Sunday evening they gather to highlight the problems facing people with disabilities along with solutions for them. This past Sunday’s show was the second of two installments dealing with the issue of medicinal cannabis. I was invited to help give the activist/patient point of view.

The Sunday before featured my friend and fellow activist Tyler Kutner in studio along with Del. Cheryl Glenn (D) Dist. 45 in Baltimore City calling in. I missed that show but understand as usual Tyler was a hit. Del. Glenn called in to highlight the difference in her approach to medical marijuana legislation and Del. Dan Morhaim’s. Personally I have been a stronger supporter of Del. Glenn’s approach.

As I hope everyone now knows the Maryland General Assembly did pass Del. Morhaim’s bill HB 1101. This week Gov. O’Malley signed that bill into law. The major lobbying organizations for marijuana reform have all refused to add Maryland to their list of states with medical marijuana laws. Why is that? Maryland’s new law gives teaching hospitals the right to apply to a commission to engage medical research of the efficacy of marijuana. What it does not do is give any rights to the patients really. Some may see the fact that if patients are participating in one of these studies they will have protection from arrest as a step forward. Of course it is for those in a study group.  However the hospitals will control everything. They’ll control everything from cultivation to distribution to which patients get to participate.

Under Del. Glenn’s bill the patients would have enjoyed far more rights including the right to personally cultivate their own medicine. Both bills call for the collection of data pertaining to how cannabis is helping the patient. As a patient I support the studying of how cannabis helps me. What I oppose is only being able to receive cannabis via a study program which may or may not accept me.

One moment from Sunday’s show that I thought was particularly telling was when co-host Michael Gerlach asked me if using marijuana would relieve the pain he suffers with due to psoriatic arthritis. I had to remember I was on the radio to keep from saying “Fuck yea!” I explained that it works wonders for the pain I deal with from osteoarthritis. Furthermore I pointed out that one of the first known medical uses of cannabis was in fact as an analgesic, nearly 5,000 years ago.

Among the other guests was Neil Franklin of LEAP (Law Enforcement Against Prohibition) a former police officer himself. While I like Neil and I am glad he supports our efforts he still retains some law enforcement points of view. For instance he said that adulterated marijuana being sold on the street is a problem. This idea has been around for quite a while. Now-a-days why would someone increase the cost of their marijuana production by adding other drugs to it? I wish Neil could have stayed more to the point of the show but since I support his position it was okay.

[I have pointed out in the past that I have been smoking weed for over forty years and the only time something was added to my cannabis I bought it because of what was added. Now was there peyote added to my pot I don’t know but it was exceptional marijuana. Any way all of this was back in college. Now thanks to several caregivers I enjoy consistent potency in the cannabis I get.]

Another guest was Richard Pannuty. Richard is a recent amputee having lost one leg below the knee following being hit by a drunk driver while riding his bike. Amputees deal with one of the mysteries of medicine, phantom pain. How a leg that is no longer there can hurt, yet it does. Frequently it does with even more intensity than the original injury. Richard uses cannabis like me for pain relief.

In the end it was a worthwhile way to spend my Sunday evening. The hosts were cordial, informed and supportive of the patients that need access to cannabis for medicinal purposes. I particularly like the show’s graphic of a little “dis” and capitalized “ABILITY.” That is how people should view people with challenges. They are all full of abilities which need to be cultivated and supported.

Don Backe

From time to time I choose to write about something other than the politics of medical marijuana. This is one of those time. I write this for my friend who is gone too soon.

One spring day I was heading into a building and saw a man in a wheelchair heading the same way. As quickly as I could on my crutches I hurried towards the door to hold it open for him. “Hey Barry, don’t you know gimps on sticks have the right-of-way.” With that one expression a word that had many times reduced me to tears when I was a boy lost all its negative meaning. Of course the gentleman in the wheelchair was Don Backe, Executive Director and founder of Chesapeake Region Accessible Boating (CRAB).

As we made our way into the Dept. of Natural Resources office Don did his best to convince me to come out that weekend and skipper a boat in the CRAB Cup Regatta. The thing was I had only been sailing for less than a year. Skippering a boat in a race was out of the question. I was still having trouble getting my little sailboat to go where I wanted it to. To Don that didn’t matter, he just wanted to make sure I knew he thought I was capable of being a skipper for CRAB.

I had met Don the year before. I had just finished restoring my boat and as I was still new to being disabled had gotten the idea I could do the same to some of the many boats lying abandoned in the area marinas. One day at Bacon Sails, http://www.baconsails.com/ I was telling my idea to one of the clerks. He said, “You know who you should talk to Don Backe at CRAB.” I had never heard of CRAB up until then. The salesman gave me Don’s phone number and told me to give him a call.

I did just that as soon as I finished checking out. To my surprise Don insisted that I come meet him at his home to discuss my idea. When I arrived he was on the phone and motioned for me to come in. When he finished his call we introduced ourselves. Over the next hour or maybe two we told each other our life’s stories and how we came to be sailors. I came home excited to tell my wife about this amazing fellow I had met that day.

Eventually I would skipper against Don in a number of sailboat races. Like most of the skippers in CRAB beating Don out on the water was always a goal. I remember prior to the first race I ever entered other skippers warning me, “Keep an eye on Don, if he has the right-of-way he will ram your boat, and then call foul on you for not giving way.” In my first CRAB Cup I finished fourth out of four, in other words dead last.

Don however made me feel like I had come in first. He called over various members of the Annapolis Yacht Club who sponsors CRAB Cup every year to introduce me. One of the things he liked to tell people about me was that I had learned to sail by reading a book. It’s true. I still proudly display the little pewter cup I won that day.

Later that summer we had a rematch in the Boatyard Bar & Grill Regatta which runs along with the larger Battle of the Chesapeake Regatta. I was amazed at the sheer number of sailboats of every size on the bay that day. I now had a few more races under my belt and had learned just how critical the start was. My boat nailed it. Off we went and next thing I know I’m rounding the first mark in the lead. Ever aware that Don was only a few boat lengths astern of me.

As we made our way along the eastern shoreline the discussion on my boat was when to tack to make the second mark and keep our lead. Then someone said Don’s making his move. If his tactic worked he beat us to the mark handily so I called for us to jibe in that direction. What neither skipper knew was that the current there was strong and the light wind we were sailing in was going to lessen even more.

Both boats nearly stalled. Seeing that Don wasn’t making any headway I decided to go back and hug the coast a little longer before tacking towards the second mark. Don having the straighter line kept on his course. We each held to our plans over the next couple of hours. Eventually I once again called for a course change, this time quickly regaining the lead. Quickly is misleading since no one was moving quickly that day. However the second mark was in sight and Don was behind me.

Before we could make the second mark the race committee boat pulled alongside. They were asking all of our names. I didn’t know why until they said okay you’ve won the race start heading back to port and after we’ve determined the other finishes we’ll come throw you a line and tow your fleet back in. I couldn’t believe it, I still have a hard time believing it, I had actually won the biggest regatta of the year but more important I had finished ahead of Don. After that Don was always telling skippers to watch out for me even though he knew my victory was a fluke.

Don was much more in life than sailor. Prior to his accident Don was an educator. He was a leader who led by example. Never one to consider himself as confined to his wheelchair. It was his freedom machine. By living with this attitude he taught others to embrace their disabilities for they will help you learn about people in general.

Don and his freedom machine did manage to get themselves in to trouble on a number of occasions. One afternoon on the CRAB docks Don was alone checking on the boats, somehow he got too close to the edge and fell into the Mezick Pond. There in the cold water he could have been lost to us forever. Luckily someone was nearby and heard his calls for help and pulled him out. That wasn’t the only time.

At the Annapolis Sailboat Show Don was called the “Mayor of the Boat Show.” To those who only casually knew Don I was frequently confused with him. See we both are heavier than we should be; both have grey hair, wear baseball caps, have beards and are in wheelchairs. It was there at our stand one year that Don again fell off the docks and into the drink.

I learned of this spill the first year I helped out at the show. People kept coming up to me asking me if I was okay. I couldn’t understand why at first. It wasn’t until someone came up to me calling me by name, Don that I realized they were confusing us. I explained to the passer about their confusion and told them Don’s around here somewhere. It was this person that told me about his spill into the creek. Later when asked about it Don told me both tales. Don wouldn’t just go around telling people stories like that. He wouldn’t want someone he was trying to convince to go sailing know to know about them. At least not until he had the chance to take them out and get them hooked on sailing.

On April 12th we lost Don. It was his time. Don had been paralyzed in an automobile accident in August 1987. In an interview he gave me for an article I wrote in BoatUS magazine he told me how sailing, being at the helm, feeling the water and wind working against the rudder he felt like it never happened. He felt well, normal. Don liked to tell new “gimps” that we all feel the eyes of others on us while we travel about on crutches or wheelchairs. It’s easy to spot a disabled person on dry land. However, when you’re in the helmsman’s seat, tiller in hand no one can tell your legs don’t work. They throw you a hardy hail and a smile as you pass. You are one of them, again.

Don was most at home on the docks in Sandy Point State Park. He especially enjoyed CRAB’s monthly Sail Free days held the fourth Sunday of each month. There you would find Don rolling around in his freedom machine supervising the comings and goings of the boats while at the same time greeting those who turned out for their free sailboat ride.

Don always had his “portable desk” on his lap so he could take down people’s contact info for “Scuttlebutt” CRAB’s periodic newsletter. In true Don style his “portable desk” was actually the paddle part of an old oar. The luckiest of visitors got to go out with Don at the helm while regaling his passengers with stories of days on the water he of course the told of the sailing opportunities now available for people with disabilities.

This past Sunday was the first Sail Free since losing Don. He would have been proud of all the volunteers that showed up to insure that Sail Free like CRAB will continue. There were misty eyes, hugs that were a little longer, and a little tighter but most importantly some 80 people were able to go sailing. This is thanks to Don Backe and his legions of volunteers at CRAB.

Don Backe will be greatly missed by those who knew and loved him. CRAB that thing he loved so much, that he worked so hard at making a successful program will go on. It will go on because of the sailors he inspired will not let it die with Don. We have all seen the joy in young newly disabled person, still struggling with their condition as their face lights up the first time the motor is turned off and they are sailing. None of us at CRAB will let that go away.

Maryland 2013- What a Mess!

In 2013 Maryland is a mess when it comes to marijuana reform. Why? Mainly because there are too many bills to address the issue of marijuana reform only one of which has much of a chance to survive and possibly pass. That bill is simply an extension of SB 308 which Gov. O’Malley signed into law in April of 2011. SB 308 provides for an affirmative defense in cases involving the medicinal use of marijuana. HB 180 simply extends that protection to caregivers. This was debated last year and failed. This bill is sponsored by Delegates Glenn & Morhaim and others.

Two other bills seek to make Maryland the 19^th state to have a medical marijuana law. These laws include New Jersey style state licensed growers and dispensaries. These bills, HB 1100 & 1101 introduced by Del. Morhaim are the same basic bill(s) he has introduced for a number of years now. They were “tweaked a bit” by 2011’s Medical Marijuana Work Group and now include a commission that either allow physicians or designated academic medical centers to recommend marijuana to select patients.

Back again this year is Del. Glenn’s more liberal bill SB 302, that would also allow Maryland to join other states in passing medical marijuana legislation. This is the bill I have always preferred as it allows for personal cultivation.

 Still Sen. Bobby Zirkin seeks to decriminalize marijuana with the introduction of two bills, SB 297 & SB 394. A hearing on SB 297 was held on Feb. 12^th you can listen to that here: http://mgahouse.maryland.gov/house/play/4db76838718246ebbe0a9bd4e6fb6be6/?catalog/03e481c7-8a42-4438-a7da-93ff74bdaa4c&playfrom=1333391

In his opening remarks he talks about medical marijuana as if SB 308 had never passed and we are still living under the provisions of the Darryl Putnam Compassionate Use Act from back in 2003. This is at the heart of the problem even our lawmakers do not understand the state marijuana laws in their own state. He was corrected by I believe by Sen. Raskin and I only say that because I believe I recognized his voice.

Even on the decriminalization issue there is two bills. One making small amounts a civil offense punishable by a fine. The other does the same thing only without the weight restriction.

Here’s the problem of where marijuana reform is in 2013, especially in Maryland. The tide is turning. Senators are seriously asking whether or not we shouldn’t go ahead legalize it. Some question whether the issue should go to referendum, fine by me on that one. When seriously considering this question lawmakers rightly ask, “Why should I over turn laws that have been on the books for years?”

The answer to that is simple, because we should have never outlawed them in the first place. There is no difference between alcohol, marijuana, heroin, meth; it doesn’t matter because they are all intoxicants. Intoxicants that can wreak havoc a person’s life. In 1919 we decided that since alcohol did all the horrible things we attribute to drugs that it should be illegal. Then in 1933 the nation collectively said, “What the fuck were we thinking? This has been a disaster, people selling fake booze that kills people, criminal paying off politicians and cops, automatic weapons fire on our city streaks, this is insane. Let them drink.”

Well the time has come to say let them get high. Stop lying about the drugs and how they will always automatically ruin your life because we have seen that is not true. Be honest that yes a lot maybe even most people who get involved with certain drugs become addicted to those drugs. But understand this; there was a gateway effect to our drug policy. The gateway was giving control over all of those different drugs to criminals. The gateway was that both the government and the pushers were lying about the drugs. Any ideas as to how this all got so screwed up?

I think somewhere in the back lawmakers’ minds there is this image of parties breaking out after pot is legal with light shows on the walls, people walking around smoking joints, loud music blaring away, young women in halter-tops and mini-skirts doing the “Frug,” and their daughter calling out, “Hey there’s an orgy going on in the other room, let’s go!”

The reality is a mother or father or both come home from ten hours of work, their body racked with pain from standing on their feet all day, or being humped over a computer screen. They make sure the kids are occupied in play and they step out to the back deck. The kids are in clear view playing in the living room or family room. There out on the deck in the heat of the summer and the cold of the winter mom and dad share a “bowl” or a ‘joint.” When they’re done, their crappy day doesn’t seem so crappy, the kids who’s play at first sounded like noise now sounds like joy. The two parents cook dinner together, do the dishes, give the kids a bath, read stories and put the kids to bed. When they are sound asleep, mom and dad put their feet up and again share some marijuana as they relax and watch TV together. This is what we call illegal activities.

There you have it. That’s the basic thumbnail sketch of marijuana reform in Maryland. I think I might have missed a bill or two but these are the highlights. What I’m going to do this year is up in the air. In the past I have come and pleaded pass this bill so I won’t have to drag my handicapped body out into the cold winds of Annapolis in the dead of winter again. I support the idea of including caregivers in the affirmative defense that I now enjoy. What I’m not certain about is whether or not I will indeed drag myself out into the cold to testify in favor of it even though it seems to have the best chance of passing. The rest are just good ideas that politicians are still too timid to enact. 

Every Day is the Day

Today is not the day to talk about gun control. We hear that after every horrifying event involving a gun and a mad man. Why? The conversation needs to begin sometime. That conversation has to not just be about gun control it has to be about violence in American society. That America is a violent society is a fact. We have to learn why and how to stop it. Every day is the day for that debate.

Every generation has one day when it is said that their childhood ended. For me it was November 22, 1963. I came home from elementary school to find my mother in tears. The president she had worked so hard to help elect was dead. Within hours we knew that Lee Harvey Oswald had bought his Carcano bolt action rifle through a mail order catalog. Now I don’t know what was being done about gun control prior to that as I was only 10, but I do know it began in earnest that day.

What has happened since that day is one tragic shooting or assassination after another. We’ve been through assassinations of Martin Luther King, Jr. and Robert F. (Bobby) Kennedy, the attempted assassinations of Presidents Ford & Reagan. Then there was Columbine, Jonesboro, Aurora … and most recently Newtown Ct. and the senseless slaughter of six and seven year old children in an elementary school.

Here in the Baltimore area we have had several instances of guns in schools this year. Thankfully none of these instances have been mass shootings, but students have been shot. Then there is Baltimore city’s murder rate, which has crept up this year after several years of decline. The overwhelming percentage of these murders was committed with hand guns.

Gun control laws are not the only answer to this problem. The problem is much more than the insane availability of guns. The problem includes poverty, poor mental health care availability, poor parenting; even the war on drugs contributes to this problem. Simply making it tougher to get a gun won’t stop the violence.

In today’s clever label society we have had wars on drugs, pornography, terrorism and the list goes on. However the one war that may have impacted all the others was abandoned. It was called liberal nonsense. That was Pres. Lyndon B. Johnson’s war on poverty.

When the first children of the greatest generation came of age they elected Pres. Reagan because he told them they should not have to pay for these “social programs.” He told them that government was the problem not the solution. It is that mentality that has stagnated America’s evolution as a more perfect union. He told the selfish faction of the baby boomer generation that their parents were wrong when they enacted Welfare, Medicare & Medicaid. He told them give more money to the rich and they will share it with the poor. Well we have seen the fallacy of this idea.

The solution to the problem of violence in our society has more folds than an origami bird. It includes crushing poverty in our inner cities, underfunded schools; media that glorifies violence, parents who use television and video games as baby sitters, children who prefer Grand Theft Auto over after school activities like school clubs and athletics, and the list goes on.

The solution is to begin to unfold the origami bird. We need to look at what is hidden in the folds. For instance poverty is a direct result of a poor educational system. You simply cannot get a good job if you can’t read by the time you give up and drop out of school. Drive by shootings is a result of the failed forty year long war on drugs. Alcohol prohibition in the early part of the twentieth century taught us prohibition doesn’t work. Psychologists teach us that children who isolate themselves for hours day in and day out in front of a TV or computer screen to play first person shooter games creates young people who lack the social skills to succeed later in life.

Yes intelligent gun regulation is a start, but only a start. We must begin to honor our parents by restoring funding to social programs aimed at lifting people up out of poverty, schools that educate instead of babysit, and once and for all recognize that substance addiction is a health problem not a crime problem. Every day is the day for this conversation.

Marijuana (Cannabis) is Safe and Effective After 30 Years of Use

This morning I received a press release from fellow medical marijuana activist, Irvin Rosenfeld. Irv is one of four living patients who were a part of what was called the "Compassionate Care Investigational New Drug protocol a program began in 1978. The then 13 living patients were "grend-fathered" in when the program was stopped under George H. W . Bush. Here is the press release:

Marijuana (Cannabis) is Safe and Effective After 30 Years of Use

On November 20^th, Irvin Rosenfeld will celebrate 30 years of receiving 10-12 Cannabis cigarettes from the United States Federal Government. He is the longest surviving of the final four Federal Medical Cannabis patients from a program that was started in 1978 and stopped under President H. W. Bush. He and 13 others were “Grand-fathered” in what is called a “Compassionate Care Investigational New Drug “protocol.

“Even though I have a severe bone tumor disorder, I am in great health because of my Cannabis use”, said Rosenfeld. “The sad part is that the Federal Government either doesn’t care or does not want to know how well I am.”

Eighteen states and D.C. have enacted laws that declared that their citizens that need Cannabis for medical use are not criminals. That’s over 40% of the population. 75-80% of the people believe that physicians should have the right to use Medical Cannabis in their practices. When will the Federal Government take real responsibility for the cost of healthcare and do what’s best for patients?

“I am living proof that Medical Cannabis works,” said Rosenfeld, author of “My Medicine” ‘How I Convinced the U.S. Government to Supply My Marijuana and Helped Launch a National Movement’ available at www.mymedicinethebook.com and on Kindle.  

Contact: Irvin Rosenfeld 954-536-9011  or skipperirv@aol.com

Asbestos Caused Cancer and Medical Marijuana

The author of the following post has asked to remain anonymous. However as you can see they have provided numerous links to support what they're saying. As for the validity of marijuana as medicine for a wide variety of conditions, well isn't that why we're all here. 

Asbestos Caused Cancer and Medical Marijuana 

Veterans who have been exposed to asbestos may be at risk for suffering serious health conditions like mesothelioma. If the asbestos-containing material was disturbed in a way that caused the fibers and particles to become airborne, this is especially of concern. The asbestos scars the lung tissue, causing breathing problems.

Symptoms of diseases caused by asbestos include shortness of breath, chest pain and coughing. These symptoms generally do not appear directly following exposure, it can take up to 50 years for symptoms to develop.

According to the Department of Veterans Affairs, veterans who served in particular occupations during their tour of duty may be at a greater risk. These occupations include milling, mining, shipyard work, demolitions, insulation work, construction, and installation of roofing and flooring products. Veterans of the Iraq War may have been exposed to asbestos when buildings were damaged or demolished.

Inhaling asbestos causes issues in the lungs and the membrane surrounding the lungs. These problems include scarring within the area surrounding the lungs and the inner surface of the ribcage. This scarring is referred to as pleural plaques and may cause breathing problems, although it is usually not as serious as asbestosis. Veterans can develop pleural plaques if they were exposed to asbestos during their tour of duty.

There are two kinds of cancer that are caused by being exposed to asbestos. These cancers are mesothelioma and lung cancer.

The symptoms of mesothelioma and lung cancer are painful. The side effects of the typical treatments that are used for mesothelioma and lung cancer are also painful. Many times, traditional prescription medications are not able to provide veterans with relief from their symptoms and pain. In these situations, when nothing else has worked, some of the individuals suffering with these conditions find medical marijuana to be the only medicine that helps them.

Marijuana has been utilized as a medicine for thousands of years. Medical marijuana helps to ease debilitating symptoms that are caused by chronic illnesses. It has been particularly effective in relieving nausea, chronic pain, loss of appetite and anxiety.

Medicines that are derived from cannabis lessen pain and improve the lives of those suffering with terminal illnesses like mesothelioma and lung cancer. These medicines include tonics, tinctures, salves and edibles derived from marijuana, etc.

Research has confirmed the medicinal value of marijuana. The cannabinoids found within cannabis may actually slow the development of specific cancers because it inhibits the formation of new blood cells and causes cell death.

Marijuana may be used in 17 states for medicinal purposes these states include Arizona, Alaska, Colorado, California, Connecticut, Delaware, Hawaii, Maine, Montana, Michigan, New Jersey, Nevada, Oregon, Vermont, Rhode Island, New Mexico and Washington.  It has been decriminalized in 14 of those states.  Seven states currently have legislation pending concerning the legalization of marijuana for medicinal purposes. These states are New York, Ohio, Illinois, Missouri, Arkansas, Pennsylvania and Massachusetts.