[Full Disclosure: The THC Foundation Medical Marijuana Clinics are primary sponsors of the Daily Audio Stash podcast.]
The C&G Newspapers in Michigan did a write-up on a story I blogged earlier about the first medical marijuana clinic to open in Michigan. I wouldn’t bring it up again except for this wonderful quote from one of the town elders:
State’s first medical marijuana clinic opens in Southfield
City Council President Don Fracassi had a lot of questions with regard to the operation of the clinic and others like it.“I opposed the issue to begin with,” Fracassi said. “But it was approved, and I don’t know how they’re going to regulate it. I don’t know how they’re going to tell who’s got pain and who doesn’t. Is it people who have no hope and are just suffering from pain? Or is it people who are hurt and are doing this instead of taking an aspirin? Is it the medical profession seeking other ways to make more money? I don’t know. I’m just against the whole thing. There is enough medication out there to serve the purpose. I think it’s going to be misused. I don’t see there’s enough controls.”
Are you a city official, frustrated with your easily-duped voters who approved medical marijuana?
How in the world will you know who’s really hopelessly in pain… and who’s just faking it to get out of taking an aspirin?
Don’t despair – we’ve got the solution for you!
It’s the new Digital Pain-o-Meter 3000 from RussCo! Crafted with space-age Owwie technology, the Digital Pain-o-Meter 3000 can register threshholds as low as the pain of a mosquito bite to as high as Guantanamo tor… er, enhanced interrogation techniques.
Now, only those people who register pain at least as severe as a repeated kick in the nuts will qualify for so-called “medical” marijuana, and the rest of them can use aspirin, acetompinophen, naproxen, ibuprofen, hydrocodone, oxycodone, and morphine like normal people.
This continued theme about chronic pain and medical marijuana is one that is repeated constantly by our opponents.
Forget about the law for a second. Let’s suppose that someone does have a minor pain that could be remedied by aspirin or over-the-counter non-steroidal anti-inflammatory like Tylenol or Aleve. These legal drugs, NSAIDs, kill about 10,000 to 20,000 Americans every year! They hospitalize many more, as these drugs are very destructive to your gut.
Why wouldn’t someone choose to take an herb that has never killed anyone instead of those pills? Cannabis is easy to use, provides immediate pain relief, eases nausea, stimulates appetite, and makes you smile. We should be encouraging cannabis use for minor pain relief – we might save a few thousand lives each year!
OK, back to reality – the Michigan program requires review by a doctor of medical records produced by another doctor, and often times, doctors. How many more controls do you want? How many people do you think are going to be successfully fooling a minimum of two doctors with symptoms of chronic pain over a period of time?
Be sure to join us next week when I’ll be talking to a few experts on the subject of pain. It’s a bigger subject than just medical marijuana – the drug war is locking up doctors who prescribe legal drugs to their patients for pain!
I am also looking for a doctor, for my mother, she lives in the Upper Peninsula and suffers from multiple sclerosis as well as chronic pain and harsh muscle spasms. Im sure she would be eligible. Anyone have any suggestions?
I have suffered from lower back pain for several years. I have degenerative disc disease, bulging discs, and arthritis in my back and I am only 29 years old. I have been taking prescribed narcotic pain meds, several times a day, for about three years. I am very interested in testing the potential positive results that medical marijuana can bring me as an alternative to these highly addictive narcotics.
I also must say that I have never used marijuana and wouldn’t even know how to prepare it to use. However, the idea of using a natural earth born product versus man made chemicals is quite appealing. I understand the stigma attached to the drugs use, but I also understand what it’s like to live every day with pain.
My condition causes me to lose feeling in my legs at times and makes it hard to be active or comfortable. In high school and college, I was a multi-sport standout. Now a short jog leaves me laying on the floor in terrible pain. if leaving the pills behind and smoking an herb will help me get life back, I’ll take on the stigma.
I was born and raised in Upper Michigan, but now live in Wisconsin. I was excited to see that this bill passed, because my family and I are planning to relocate back to Michigan. Now it seems that I may be able to get a more healthy form of relief from my back pain.
Can anyone give me the name and location of a clinic or physician in Upper Michigan that I can see to discuss my options?
Thank you.
Shawn
I find it utterly hilarious how the opponents of Medical Marijuana fight so hard to show how “evil” and “terrible” marijuana is, and what a detriment to society it is becoming. It seems that the harder they try to fight, the more ignorant they sound.
If this wonderful plant had been re-introduced to the world as the natural herb Cannabis that has been found to ease chronic pain and help with a number of other symptoms, there would be a pharmaceutical company peddling it on prime-time commercials right now.
It is the fear-mongering that keeps society cowed, and if we don’t WAKE UP and educate ourselves and those around us to the benefits of Medical Cannabis, we will forever be forced to become users of “legal” drugs that will ultimately kill us.