Medical marijuana has been one of the largest legal controversies of the 21st century, as 24 states have legalized the the use of medical marijuana, and another six are considering it. Although many states have legalized medical marijuana or considered it, not much has changed in the minds of the United States federal government. In fact, the federal government seems against the movement of medical marijuana becoming legalized throughout the nation, as they spent 483 million dollars on interfering with specific state medical marijuana laws, conducting over 500 raids and dozens of prosecutions from 1996-2012 (Kreit 690). Furthermore, the federal government banned the Department of Justice from spending money to stop the passing of state medical marijuana laws. The federal government has finally come down to the fact that prohibiting medical marijuana in states that have already begun to draw up reform is no longer a choice (Kreit 691). 

With several states starting to legalize medical marijuana, America needs to start considering policies that will control marijuana use, so that in the long run, medical marijuana dispensaries can safely distribute medical marijuana. In all reality, medical marijuana will be legalized in all 50 states in the near future, especially because almost half of the nation has legalized it already, so why should the country be divided for any longer? After all, this is the UNITED states of America. Michael Eisenstein makes a valid point in his article by quoting a pharmacist who says, "The problems associated with implementing a medical marijuana law are in part attributable to the fact that this decision, which requires sophisticated scientific understanding, has been given to the public. If the majority of voters are in favor of overall legalization, then let's just make it consistent across states" (Eisenstein S16).

Many Americans believe that medical marijuana legalization leads to more abuse of the the drug, and also that it will lead to the use and abuse of harder drugs (Wyllie). However, Michael Eisenstein claims, "One recent analysis showed that although adolescent use is higher in states that allow medical marijuana, passage of those laws did not lead to increased use  --  suggesting that pre-existing local attitudes may be the primary factor" (Eisenstein S16). Several Americans also think that marijuana "turns law abiding citizens into criminals," but all of these problems can be either avoided or made better by medical marijuana policies (Wyllie). Policies will alleviate the potential harmful consequences of legalized medical marijuana and they will also regulate public health regarding the use of medical marijuana, because many Americans will end up abusing it. Policies will also aid in educating the public on safe ways to use medical marijuana, seen in Colorado. These conflicts of laws between states and the federal government are too much trouble, so the federal government needs to implement medical marijuana policies throughout the nation to regulate the use of the drug (Ghosh 21). After all, so many people use medical marijuana either legally or illegally, so policies need to be set in place in the United States. These policies will also help entrepreneurs, like Hugh Hempel, to distribute their product safely throughout the nation (Hempel). 

Colorado has begun to crack down on it's medical marijuana policy by developing new policies, and also building off of old ones, especially discussed in "The Public Health Framework of Legalized Marijuana in Colorado," an article by Tista Ghosh. The article talks about how Colorado has built a marijuana policy to regulate public health, a policy that should be mirrored by every other state and the federal government once medical marijuana becomes fully legalized. Ghosh mentions that medical marijuana policy should stem off of the policies for tobacco and alcohol, with regulations such as increased taxes, limited hours of sale, regulating retail outlet density, and enhanced enforcement of licensed retailers (Ghosh 23). The Department of Public Health in Colorado has also restricted sales to people 21 and over, and they are also making it important to educate the public about responsible medical marijuana use, dangers of underage marijuana use, and dangers of using marijuana for non-medical reasons. It is clear that people are going to abuse medical marijuana once it is legalized, but Colorado's policies regarding marijuana use show an effort to reduce abuse, and also to express concern for the public regarding the potential health effects of recreational and medical marijuana (Ghosh 24). 

Certainly, policies like Colorado's have, and will, take time and money to be put in place, but I believe that if every state develops a policy that reflects that of Colorado's, then America will become a safe place to legalize and distribute medical marijuana. In addition, these policies will give assurance to people who are concerned that the legalization of medical marijuana will lead to more abuse of the drug, and people who are concerned about public health problems and overall production of the country (Wyllie). As mentioned before, policies will take a lot of time and money to be set in stone, but this time and money will lead to less time and money being spent on marijuana prohibition, as well less time and money spent on arrests and testing of medical marijuana growers, sellers, and users in states where the drug is illegal. Doug Wyllie even specifically quotes a California police officer in his article who says, "There is no question that money will be saved from top to bottom in the justice system, from the officer who takes time away from other duties to the lab who verifies that the green leafy substance is marijuana to the court system, and finally, to the jails and prisons" (Wyllie). In conclusion, if these policies work for Colorado, and other states start to implement these precautionary policies, then there is no reason medical marijuana should not be legalized by the federal government for the whole country. Also, if the federal government legalized medical marijuana, then they could develop a nationwide policy for medical marijuana, which would eliminate the conflicts between policies of individual states, and in turn would help entrepreneurs distribute it more easily through their dispensaries. 

Policies and overall legalization are important topics to cover, but why should medical marijuana be legalized in the first place? Well, medical marijuana has proven to have certain health benefits, some of which are life saving. Hugh Hempel describes how a certain form of cannabis saved his eleven-year-old twin daughters lives in his Ted Talk titled, "Why I Changed My Mind About Medical Cannabis." Hempel even claims at the start of his talk that, "medical marijuana could be the healthcare success story of our lifetimes." His twins were diagnosed with a rare disease called Childhood Alzheimer's early in their lives, and they are now going through rigorous pharmaceutical treatments. In fact, they were told that they would not live to be twelve years old. Their daily seizures were becoming more and more detrimental to their situation, until Hempel discovered an injectable form of cannabis that relieved his children's symptoms, such as seizures. Hempel's mother thought that the legalization of medical marijuana would be a "threat to society," until she saw what it did to her grandchildren. Hempel now sells medical cannabis in Nevada because of what happened with his daughters, but he worries about the other 2 million people in America that suffer from epilepsy and seizure disorders that cannot access medical marijuana because it is illegal (Hempel). Hempel draws out a clear example why the federal the government should legalize medical marijuana so that entrepreneurs, like Hempel, can easily distribute medical marijuana to patients who need it.

Seizures are not the only thing that medical marijuana can provide relief for. Christopher Mathias makes this clear by providing real situations in which patients have had to use medical marijuana illegally in New York, before it became legalized, to relieve their symptoms in his Huffington Post article, "Here's Why New York Needs to Legalize Medical Marijuana Now." In one instance, Mathias talks about a man named James Paires who smokes medical marijuana to relieve his symptoms of Multiple Sclerosis. Paires claims that medical marijuana helps his symptoms a lot more than his prescribed medication. He also tries to avoid using prescribed medication because of it's damage to the liver. Another man named Jim also uses medical marijuana to help with the fatigue, restlessness, occasional nausea and severe pain associated with his HIV. "But with medical marijuana illegal in New York, Jim has to break the law every time he uses the substance that best alleviates his symptoms," writes Mathias regarding the situation. He mentions another patient whose mother will not let her use medical marijuana to alleviate her symtoms, even though her mother knows it helps with her symptoms. Mathias quotes the patient who says, "If it were legal and bought from a legal dispensary, my mother would allow me to use medical marijuana. She hates watching me suffer, but she is afraid."

 Medical Marijuana is now legal in New York, but this article portrays how patients may struggle in states where medical marijuana is illegal and they do not have access to a legal dispensary (Mathias). 

Jennifer Welsh and Kevin Loria add to the list of the health benefits of medical marijuana through their article titled, "23 Health Benefits of Medical Marijuana." Welsh and Loria talk about how cannabidiol (CBD) and tetrahydrocannabinol (THC) have pain relieving properties, among others. Health benefits on their list include Glaucoma, for medical marijuana decreases pressure in the eyeball, allowing patients to improve their vision. Many uninformed Americans believe that smoking medical marijuana is bad for your lungs (Wyllie). Well, researchers found that people who smoke tobacco show a decrease in lung function and capacity, while pot smokers show an increase in lung capacity in a study of 5,115 young adults. Furthermore, a chemical found in medical marijuana has proven to stop certain types of cancer from spreading. Several Americans believe marijuana causes cancer, but Cannabidiol found in marijuana stops cancer by turning off a gene called Id-1, which produces more copies of cancer cells in the particular gene. Medical marijuana has also been found to slow progress of Alzheimer's, treat inflammatory bowel disease, and help with nausea and pain associated with chemotherapy, mentioned in the article. War veterans, among others, use medical marijuana to relieve their symptoms of post-traumatic stress disorder. In fact, PTSD is the main reason that medical marijuana is prescribed in some states where it is legal (Loria, Welsh). 

"Medical Marijuana: Showdown at the Cannabis Corral," provides even more evidence of medical marijuana's health benefits. Michael Eisenstein writes about a woman who provided "pot brownies" to AIDS patients when visiting them, which resulted in her being arrested multiple times. Coincidentally, those "pot brownies" helped relieve those patient's pain more than their prescribed medicine. A doctor from that particular hospital in San Francisco claimed, "I had a number of patients going to a dispensary in Oakland who told me that they were getting more relief from marijuana than from the medicine I gave them." Eisenstein points out that there is not enough hard evidence and studies to legalize medical marijuana around the country, which is a problem because so many patients are reaping the benefits of the drug (Eisenstein S15-S17). In fact, only 6% of studies on marijuana focus on medicinal value (Loria, Welsh). 

Realistically, one of the major problems with legalizing medical marijuana in the United States is research. Either marijuana studies do not focus completely on the medical value of the drug, or not enough research is conducted to provide hard evidence in order to change the minds of the federal government. Also, the federal government does not want to fund studies for medical marijuana, so states like Colorado are using their funds from marijuana sales to aid in the research process. Eisenstein discusses two veteran cannabis researchers who are making significant progress by studying how medical marijuana can effect sickle cell anemia, and also PTSD. "There's an opportunity for us to take a global leadership position  --  the world is crying out for some direction in managing not just medical, but also recreational cannabis," he says. "This should stop being an issue for legal minds to wrestle over; it should be the scientists that are putting the evidence together that drive the policy," the researchers say (Eisenstein S17). In conclusion, if cannabis researchers take the initiative to find out the scientific evidence of the health benefits of medical marijuana, and supporters fund the research, then the evidence of the benefits should be enough to convince the federal government to legalize medical marijuana. These studies take a lot of time and money, but I believe that this time and money will be well spent so that America can edge closer to letting entrepreneurs develop medical marijuana dispensaries so people can use medical marijuana for their health benefit. 

These patients that need medical marijuana, from Hugh Hempel's twin daughters, to the New York residents in Chris Mathias' article, will need a dispensary to provide them with medical marijuana. Hundreds of dispensaries exist in states like Colorado, California, Nevada, and the District of Columbia where medical marijuana is legal, but patients in illegal states are not so lucky. They have to buy and use medical marijuana illegally, including citizens who have never committed a criminal act in their entire life, which is exactly why medical marijuana needs to be legalized across the nation. Other patients have to travel long distance to be able to purchase medical marijuana, which is not ideal in any situation. 

Medical marijuana entrepreneurs, whom want to aid people that could reap the medical benefits of medical marijuana, are all over the country now. A majority of them cannot start their dream business because they reside in states where medical marijuana is illegal, such as MedMen. Eliza Gray discusses how two "pot-preneurs" wish to expand their incredible company into states where medical marijuana is illegal in her Time Magazine article, "Dope Dreams." MedMen, a company founded by non-smokers Adam Bierman and Andrew Modlin, has not opened a single store yet, and Bierman cannot ship medical marijuana across state lines where it is illegal because of federal law. Also, it is difficult for the partners to run their business in different states with different regulations, relating back to the point that the federal government needs to draw up a nation-wide policy to avoid regulatory conflicts. Marijuana experts predict that one-third of Americans will have access to legal medical marijuana, so why not the other two thirds? Whether the federal government likes it or not, medical marijuana will become a mainstream medical treatment for certain diseases and illnesses in the near future. Gray concludes the article perfectly regarding this point when she writes, "But for all that, Bierman believes full legalization is inevitable as well as its acceptance in the mainstream. In his dreams, pot will soon take its place in the very pantheon of American culture" (Gray 47-48). 

In another article titled "High Stakes," Joe Robinson discusses how a man named Ata Gonzalez had to move all the way to California to start his now-successful medical marijuana growing business. The article touches on how medical marijuana is a hard business to start, especially with the federal government not cooperating, as a well as banks that will not partner with medical marijuana dispensaries. Robinson writes, "Medical marijuana is legal only in 23 states and the District of Columbia, and recreational weed is legal in Colorado, Washington and, as of November, Alaska, Oregon and the District of Columbia. Each state has its own rules, making a central manufacturing system difficult. And then there's the banking problem" (Robinson 24). This extends on the point that medical marijuana should be federally legalized so that entrepreneurs do not have to go through constant struggle to satisfy patients that need medical marijuana.

Besides the point that some American citizens think that medical marijuana causes lung cancer, heart disease, use of harder drugs, and an increased use of marijuana, other Americans think legalizing medical marijuana will lead to decreased overall productivity, more use at younger ages, and they also believe it will lead to more carelessness and reckless behavior (Godwin). If medical marijuana does become completely legalized, America will advocate the dangerous uses of the substance, and research will show how medical marijuana can be used in harmful ways. Hillary Godwin makes noticeable points in her article, "How Marijuana Could Change America," especially when she says, "If used responsibly under controlled conditions for its intended purpose, it is unlikely that its use will cause harm to anyone, including the user. If people in need of its medical uses have legal access to it in the future, the rates of drug addiction would likely decline, and many Americans would not have to sacrifice more of their health for the sake of legality" (Godwin). In terms of productivity, Godwin makes an exceptional point when she writes, "If marijuana becomes a culturally recognized legal activity, the government would be able to spend more federal funding on improving education, healthcare, and public safety for future generations," so in turn, legalizing medical marijuana would increase productivity, especially with more money for education (Godwin).

In conclusion, medical marijuana should be legalized in America so that entrepreneurs can help citizens and medical facilities reap the health benefits of medical marijuana. There are many reasons why medical marijuana should be legalized, but the health benefits and entrepreneurial opportunities associated with medical marijuana stick out as the two most promising leads towards the legalization of medical marijuana. Marijuana can alleviate the symptoms of certain diseases, and also potentially stop the spreading of cancer, proven through several studies and personal experiences (Loria, Welsh). Certain chemicals in marijuana, such as CBD and THC, effect certain parts of the body in ways that reduce pain, stress, nausea, and seizures. The legality of medical marijuana prevents certain entrepreneurs from starting their dream businesses to help Americans that can use medical marijuana to help their disease or condition (Gray 47-48). There remain several states where patients have to use medical marijuana illegally to acquire the medical benefits of the drug, especially seen through the Ted Talk with Hugh Hempel, and also the interviews of New York residents with Christopher Mathias, so their remains one simple solution. The federal government must legalize medical marijuana to uphold the title of The UNITED States of America, because a divided nation and divided policies do not aid the medical marijuana entrepreneurs and patients around this nation in using medical marijuana for health benefits. After all, you cannot spell healthcare without THC. 

 
