Does marijuana have medicinal value?
- Yes. Research to date has found limited clinical value in one compound of its FDA approved form, not in its smoked or raw form.
- Smoking is an ineffective and illogical way to deliver medicine – dosage cannot be regulated, and tar and other harmful compounds are delivered directly to the lungs along with any helpful cannabinoids (compounds in marijuana).
- In fact, Dr. Robert DuPont, former director of NIDA, says, “There is no acceptable role in modern medicine for using burning leaves as a drug delivery system because smoke is inherently unhealthy.”
- Other delivery methods aren’t safer either; vaporizing does not filter cancer-causing tar or other chemicals, and eating delivers the same damaging compounds as well as the insecticides and fungi found in unmonitored crops.
- Clinical research is being conducted into a controlled, tested, safe delivery system (that can be prescribed and managed) of the helpful cannabinoids of marijuana without any of the harmful chemicals or dangerous side effects.