W ASHINGTON , DC - Marijuana today received the imprimatur of the most August body science of the United States: the drug and its active ingredients can relieve pain, nausea and vomiting associated with chemotherapy and anorexia of AIDS wasting syndrome, according to a report by the Institute of the National Academy of science of Medicine (IOM). The report, released at a news conference here today, also calls for more clinical trials of marijuana and efforts to develop new synthetic drugs that mimic the active ingredients of the pot. For now, the smoke of marijuana for medical use is recommended only in rare circumstances, such as for terminal patients.
Since 1996, voters in seven states have approved ballot initiatives that allow the medical use of marijuana. In response to the often heated debate, the White House Office of National Drug Control Policy there about 2 years commissioned IOM to review the scientific literature on the health effects of marijuana and medical benefits potential. According to Stanley Watson, co-director of the Mental Health Research Institute at the University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, and an author of the report, the panel found no evidence that medical marijuana use leads the abuse of other illicit drugs. Beyond the damage due to smoking, marijuana has no worse side effects than any other approved drug, the panel found. Because the majority of evidence suggests that marijuana is effective in relieving pain, stimulating appetite, and elimination of nausea and vomiting, the report recommends that Watson called "compassionate use of marijuana."
This verdict pleases many patient advocacy groups. "This report clearly shows that there is scientific evidence for medical benefits in good faith for some patients," said Chuck Thomas, spokesman for the Marijuana Policy Project. But others criticize the report to limit recommendations for cases serious and not to recommend ways for patients to take the drug without smoking. "There are ways around smoking marijuana, but the report makes no mention of them," says psychiatrist Lester Grinspoon of Harvard Medical School in Boston, who was one of 13 external experts review the report before the end. for example, delivery into the lungs rapidly acting, Grinspoon said vaporizers already exist that selectively extract vapors cannabinoids without burning the plant material. Adds Thomas "many patients eat ;. marijuana is no more dangerous than eating Valium"
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