Marijuana in society today is known as a gateway drug. Most teenagers start smoking marijuana and move on to more addictive drugs. This at first may seem like your regular legalize weed essay from a pot head student in class, but it is far from it. About 12 years ago, my mother started getting the welt like hives all over her body that would itch uncontrollably and hurt. She would get them in her eyes and ears anywhere; you can imagine. We could not figure out what was wrong with her. We assumed she had an allergic reaction to something around her. One day her hemoglobin dropped so low doctors were amazing she was even conscious. We took her to the hospital, and they could not diagnose her with anything they gave her a shot of a Corticosteroid called prednisone. Therefore, they sent her to a rheumatologist, which is a doctor, those diagnosis patients and tells them what to do to manage their disease. The rheumatologist could not pin point what was going on with my mom, but he knew it seemed a lot like lupus. He then decided to diagnose her with autoimmune hemolytic anemia. Autoimmune hemolytic anemia is an autoimmune disease where your immune system attacks red blood cells as a threat to the body and destroys them. In lemans terms, she is allergic to herself. My mother had to begin take a Corticosteroid called prednisone to suppress her immune system. Taking prednisone over a long period can be harmful to the individual giving them mood swings and making the gain unnecessary weight (Staff, Mayo Clinic). I was researching treatments for autoimmune hemolytic anemia when I came across an article about a drug called Sativex, which is a liquid spray form of medical marijuana (Royal National Hospital for Rheumatic Diseases). I begin to ...
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...ijuana: Clearing Away The Smoke." Open Neurology Journal 6.(2012): 18-25. Academic Search Complete. Web. 31 Oct. 2013.
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"Royal National Hospital for Rheumatic Diseases, Bath; Cannabis- Based Sativex Effective for Rheumatoid Arthritis Pain Relief." Physician Law Weekly (2006): 368. ProQuest. Web. 16 Oct. 2013.
After smoking, or consuming marijuana, it is distributed in the brain. The concentration of marijuana in the brain may be governed by an active transport process in the choroid plexus network of blood vessels in the brain which regulates intraventricular pressure by absorption and secretion of cerebro spinal fluid. one scientific experiment it gave an example of how the distribution of marijuana in the central nervous system could effect man. At a high dose of 30 mg./kg. marked sedation and pronounced motor incoordination peaked at the one hour interval subsiding in 8 hours when over reaction occurred to external stimuli; man reveals incapacitation of cognitive and motor function. High concentrations of marijuana are usually found in the following parts of the brain: the frontal cortex (the general association area), and hippocampus (short term memory and oreintation). As a result, perception of time, mood and general cordination is impaired. It is apparent that marijuana intoxication effects the neurological functions and usually disappears in 24 hours, but can become a permanent malfunction.THC effec...
Legalization of Marijuana has quickly become a controversial issue in America. In the United States, legalization of marijuana for medicinal purposes is spreading to the state level. For example, in November 1996, the people of California and Arizona voted to legalize marijuana for medicinal reasons. As a result of Proposition 215 in California, patients now smoke marijuana provided their physician recommends its usage. A prescription is not required, and marijuana continues to be illegal to prescribe. The Clinton administration responded that it “would not recognize these decisions, and would prosecute physicians who recommend or provide marijuana to their patients.” Although California and Arizona are the only two states to have already passed laws regulating marijuana usage, twenty-six states and the District of Columbia have laws and resolutions regarding marijuana usage. These laws and resolutions range from establishing therapeutic research programs, to allowing doctors to prescribe marijuana, to asking the federal government to lift the ban. Despite the states’ desires to have marijuana legalized for medicinal purposes, the US National Institutes of Health examined all existing clinical evidence about smoked marijuana and concluded that, “There is no scientifically sound evidence that smoked marijuana is medically superior to currently available therapies.”
Thesis: Despite its legal status cannabis and CBD has been recognized as being beneficial in many ways. After all, cannabis and CBD has been medically beneficial when treating pain, seizures, and cancer.
With marijuana is becoming legal in some states for medical reasons, other states are still questioning how marijuana can be beneficial and even a problem. In “The Truth about Medical Marijuana” by Carrie Shortsleeve, published in 2013 on the website Men’s Health, Shortsleeve describes how tetrahydrocannabinol or THC, found in marijuana, can be used for medical benefits. In the passage, she explains how the immune system and brain are affected by THC especially if the substance is high in dosage. When Dr. Mahmoud ElSohly, Ph.D., “the director of the University of Mississippi’s Marijuana Project,” injured his back, he begins to research what benefits marijuana has when using the drug as medicine, and Shortsleeve shares this with people who maybe considering medical marijuana. Shortsleeve uses statistics, in depth research, and real- life situations to show how some people trust marijuana as medicine; even though, some of these people were once against medical marijuana.
Works Cited "The California Marijuana Vote." New Yorker 23 Dec 1996: 62+. Brookhiser, Richard. "Pot Luck." National Review 11 Nov 1996: 27+ Simmons, Michael. "Give Pot a Chance." Rolling Stone 26 Dec 1996: 111+. Rist, Curtis and Harrison, Laird. "Weed the People." People 21 Oct. 1996: 75+. Funk and Wagnall's Volume 23 "Marijuana" 1996 Baum, Dan. "California's Separate Peace." Rolling Stone 30 Oct. 1997: 43+ Brookhiser, Richard. "Lost in the Weed." U.S. News & World Report 3 Jan. 1997: 9 Buckley, William "Legalization of Marijuana Long Overdue" The Albuquerque Journal. Online. 8 June 1993.
Strict approval processes are limiting the research necessary for such advancements (Medical Marijuana Research News). Despite federal and state illegalization, twenty-one states over the past decade have made advances to legalize marijuana for medicinal purposes (“State Medical Marijuana Laws”). It is time for Texas to acknowledge the benefits and eliminate the stigma surrounding medicinal marijuana. Medical marijuana should be legalized in Texas because of its’ medicinal benefits associated with many chronic diseases and the potential revenue the state could benefit from during this time of recession. Marijuana in America became a popular ingredient in many medicinal products and was openly sold in pharmacies in the late nineteenth century (“Busted-America’s War on Marijuana Timeline”).
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Despite the 1976 ruling by the federal government that marijuana has “no acceptable medical use”, sixteen states have passed medical marijuana laws that allow for patient use o...
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