RE “Medical marijuana law takes form” (Page A1, Feb. 6): The public is outraged when a prescription medication thought to be safer and more effective than other options is found to have harmful effects. (One such example is Vioxx, a pain reliever that was associated with small increases in heart attacks among people with heart disease.) Yet marijuana is supported as therapeutic, and called “medical,” without any placebo-controlled clinical trials that would tell us the benefits and risks.
It won’t be prescribed by doctors — doctors are to “certify” patients to get it — or dispensed by pharmacists. The Food and Drug Administration won’t be able to monitor risks the same way it does for other medications. Let’s face it — it isn’t medical; or, if it is, it has somehow escaped the usual scrutiny.
Comments
Apparently, the doctor is unaware that the only reason there is no extensive history of clinical research on marijuana is that the same laws that bar its production, distrubtion and use also contain language that makes it nearly impossible conduct research on its effects.
The DEA still considers marijuana a schedule 1 controlled substance. How does a doctor not know that?
The Dr. is well aware. But the fact that it is difficult to study and that it is Schedule I do not change the fact that we have no placebo-controlled trials. The point is that patients deserve to know the efficacy and safety. Just because that is difficult to obtain doesnt make it any less necessary, and doesnt justify treating this marijuana differently from all other medications. This is not about legalization, this is about how it doesnt make sense to medicalize something that isnt medical. If it is medical, then treat it as such.