Marijuana has been a leading topic of discussion for many years now. The push for marijuana to become legal is slowly rising by the encouragement of states to make marijuana legal for medical purposes. In the past few years, a substantial increase in states legalizing marijuana for medical benefits have come about, due to new research that uncovered ground-breaking evidence. This evidence reveals how beneficial marijuana can be for patients with glaucoma, epilepsy, Parkinson’s, nausea stimulated by chemo and AIDS. Due to this ground-breaking research, medical marijuana continues to be a subject tossed around in the media for consideration of legalization. In fact, the subject is becoming more recognized than it already was, now that the remaining states that have not legalized marijuana, are taking the matter into consideration. However, the push to legalize marijuana for medical purposes has caused a divide in views. Some people believe that marijuana should remain illegal because of how addictive it can be, how taxing it can be on someone’s mental and physical state, and how it decimates a person’s life (Hawkins). The others believe that marijuana should be legal because of how prohibition has enormous social cost, the benefits of criminalization do not exist, cannabis is less harmful than alcohol or tobacco, and most importantly, how marijuana has legitimate medical side effects (Poindexter). Despite these difference of outlooks, marijuana should be legalized for medical purposes because of the overwhelming evidence from current and continuous research, patient cases, and experimental research completed by doctors.

The first question many people may ponder is, “What exactly is marijuana?”  According to the American Cancer Society Team, “Marijuana is the name given to the dried buds and leaves of varieties of the Cannabis sativa plant…” (The American Cancer Society Team). Marijuana has been used as an herbal remedy for centuries due to its biologically active components (American Cancer Society Team). Delta-9-tetrahydrocannabinol, also known as THC, is one of the biologically active components that stimulates the high people feel when they smoke, ingest, or inhale marijuana. Another biological active component is cannabinol, also known as CBD, which can, “counteract the “high” caused by THC” (American Cancer Society Team). Marijuana comes in many different types and strains, which make certain plants have higher or lower effects on people. Also, marijuana will create a different effect, depending on how it enters a person’s body. However, the high that this drug produces is what makes it continue to be such a popular drug; people become addicted to the high that marijuana creates in their body, which in turn, creates the issue on how it could possibly be unsafe to use medically, without all the other possible side effects. 

 Now that there is an understanding to exactly what marijuana is, the most important thing to point out is how marijuana can be medically beneficial for its consumers. Marijuana is used to treat different diseases in different ways; however, the main use of this drug medically is for pain (Harding). Marijuana is also prescribed by doctors for other symptoms and problems that include, “muscle spasms caused by multiple sclerosis, nausea from cancer chemotherapy, poor appetite and weight loss caused by chronic illness, such as HIV, or nerve pain, seizure disorders, or Crohn’s disease” (Harding). In fact, marijuana can “decrease intraocular pressure in the treatment of glaucoma” (Volkow). As stated before, marijuana contains many different biochemical parts, which means not every part of marijuana is needed to aid in relief for the symptoms and conditions stated above. With that being said, “your body already makes marijuana-like chemicals that affect pain, inflammation, and many other processes” (Harding). So when a doctor prescribes marijuana to a patient, the intention of the marijuana is to act in a way to assists those natural chemicals to work more efficiently. For this drug to be used medically, the most common ways to use it is “smoking, vaporizing, eating, or taking it as a liquid extract” (Harding). There are also many other ways marijuana can be used medically, it just all depends on a person’s case, and what way and which location of the body it needs to effect. Despite the known side-effects of smoking marijuana, “smoking marijuana flowers is the well-known method of administration” (United Patients Group). The reason smoking marijuana is the most common way of medicating is because, “[it] delivers instant relief, fairly easy to regulate dosage, inexpensive, minimally processed, [and has] multiple options” (United Patients Group). Even though these are all very good things, all good things must come with some side effect; “Smoke may be harmful to lungs. Studies have reached contradictory conclusions about whether and to what extent cannabis may cause lung damage, but combustion of any substance makes it harder to breathe” (United Patients Group). Even though these side effects do exist, the patients who actually endure the problems that call for marijuana treatment believe that whatever problems that will eventually come along with it will be worth it, if that means their pain can be taken away for even just the slightest amount of time. 

With that being said, one little girl, Charlotte Figi, age five years old, was diagnosed with SCN1A-confirmed Dravet syndrome. With this disease comes a long road of seizures that happen multiple times of day and at random, unknown times; “Her first seizure was prolonged status epilepticus at 3 months of age” (Maa). After this, Charlotte continued to have three different types of seizures that eventually lead her to have continuous care at a Level 4 Epilepsy Center. With failures of medications and barely having the ability to accept her food and water from her feeding tube, ‘her family was told that she “had reached the end of the road”’ (Maa). At this point in her life, “[she] was experiencing up to 50 generalized tonic-clonic seizures per day” (Maa). Charlotte’s doctors and mother felt like there was nothing left to do at this point because the use of medical marijuana on a patient this young was so strongly discouraged. However, her doctors found the Stanley Brothers, who are now a nonprofit organization to help epilepsy patients, that produce a very rare strain of marijuana high in CBD that was safe enough for Charlotte to begin taking in low dosages. With gradual increase of dose, “Charlotte experience seven consecutive days without a single seizure!” (Maa). “Charlotte has only 2-3 nocturnal GTC seizure per month, is feeding and drinking orally and on her own, sleeps soundly through the night, and her autistic behaviors (self-injury, aggressiveness, self-stimulating behavior, etc.) have improved” (Maa) In fact, “she has had only one episode of autonomic dysfunction associated with Dravet syndrome in the same time period, [and] she is finally walking and talking again” (Maa). This miraculous recovery would have never occurred if marijuana would have not been medically legal. Through many trial and errors, retests, and lessened dosages, Charlotte’s doctor realized how Charlotte would not be able to function on a day-to-day basis without the right amount of marijuana: 

“When we reached 2 mg of CBD/lb per day (from her steady dose of 4 mg CBD/lb per day), Charlotte's seizures started coming back and when she was completely off the CW, her seizures returned to 5–10 GTC seizures per day for 3 days, at which time we restarted CW. To see if the seizures would recur without CW, we have done this two other times and have had the same results each time” (Maa). 

This clinical case shows how much of an impact marijuana can have on someone’s life expectancy. If marijuana would not have been legal for this young girl to access medically, based on her chances to live stated by her doctor, she would be dead today. Despite some of the negative effects that can come from marijuana if not used the proper way, this is an amazing example as to what good marijuana can do if legalized medically for a person that has no other option but death.

Another case that provides research and data on how marijuana medically helps a person with critical health conditions is a guy named Larry who struggles with Parkinson’s tremor dyskinesia. Larry has a YouTube channel that shows his everyday struggle and battle with Parkinson’s called “Ride with Larry”. He has a video called “Medical Marijuana and Parkinson’s,” which is broken up into three-part videos.  The videos show how Larry functions daily, and then they show how he functions while he uses medical marijuana. The first part of the three-part mini-episodes shows Larry uncomfortably trying to talk to other people while not currently under the influence of marijuana. He uncontrollably shakes, cannot focus his sight on one thing, constantly has to be moving around, and he cannot produce words entirely. When he tries to walk, the narrator comes on a says, “he has had so much trouble walking now, he takes 20 pills a day” (Ride with Larry 1 of 3). The second part starts off with Larry and a woman walking into the dispensary that is going to let him legally access medical marijuana for the first time. When the unidentified lady begins to discuss Larry’s problems with the provider of the medical marijuana, she states, “he has this real problem with dyskinesia, and some of it is actually the result of the drugs he has to take, so that he can move” (Ride with Larry 2 of 3). The seller then goes into discussion about how marijuana is the better option for someone with a disease like Larry; the medicine people have to take with Parkinson’s can be so expensive, and can have so many bad side effects, when, on the other hand, marijuana is the cheaper and more effective choice since it can cure all of his symptoms by just this one drug. Larry’s medication costs $3000 to refill every time and the deep brain stimulation he has to receive was said to be, “about a quarter of a million dollars, and every time Larry’s batteries run down and need to be replaced, it is around $80,000” (Ride with Larry 2 of 3).  This segment ends with the unidentified woman stating how the medical marijuana they just purchased was only $40 compared to the $100,000 they are used to spending, so she is quite interested to see if the marijuana will actually be able to cure all of Larry’s symptoms. The final part, part 3 of the short videos, finally shows how Larry reacts to using marijuana for the first time. The video begins with Larry walking into a room, and he states how it has been a rough week. A fellow Parkinson’s patient is present in the room to instruct Larry on how to use the marijuana. The fellow patient tells Larry that the best thing to do is to rub the stick containing one drop of marijuana, specific amount not identified, on the inside of his cheek and under his tongue. A time stamp of 1:37 appears to mark the time of when Larry ingested the one drop of marijuana. The video is fast forwarded to 1:41, which is only four minutes from the time Larry ingested the marijuana. To recall, Larry was fidgeting and unable to stop moving in the beginning, and by the time the four minutes had passed, all of those symptoms had vanished. Larry then states “how quickly” he already feels a difference. The female voice appears while showing Larry’s hands on the screen still and says, “he used just a single drop and his hands afterwards were just rock steady, and the dyskinesia left” (Ride with Larry 3 of 3). Not only do his hands stop shaking, but his voice manages to come back. The video puts the before and after footage side-by-side; the footage shows a remarkable recovery of a man who before, could not function on his own, and then after marijuana, could act, walk, and talk like an everyday, healthy man would. These segments confirm how marijuana controls the life of a person battling with Parkinson’s. When marijuana is not accessible to these groups of people, they have to endure unrealistic medical bills for numerous medications that do not even do near as much justice on their health as marijuana does. If marijuana was made legal for medical purposes, it could save Parkinson’s patients more money, up into the 1000’s, could also keep the patients away from the side effects that come along with taking such a large quantity of different medications, and could relieve their pain in a more natural way that is healthier on the human body. 

Even with all of this substantial evidence on how beneficial medical marijuana can be for a person’s life, some may still argue the opposite that marijuana should not be legalized medically. As shown above, marijuana has been proven to help in dozens of cases, but there is still a disagreement on whether or not the negative side effects, brought along with the use of marijuana, are minimum enough to not have long-term effects on a person’s health. These negative side effects are said to possibly cause addiction, have effects on brain development, cause mental illnesses, and to causes problems in school performances and lifetime achievements (Volkow). Now that research has been completed, doctors realize that cannabis withdrawal syndrome, which includes symptoms of irritability, sleeping difficulties, dysphoria, craving and anxiety, can be a primary issue for someone who constantly uses marijuana (Volkow). In fact, if an adolescent has to use marijuana constantly for medical purposes before their brain fully develops, it could result in “long-term changes in brain function that can jeopardize educational, professional, and social achievements” (Volkow). However, these things are more prone happening in a person that smokes an abundance of marijuana daily for recreational use, not a patient that has been given an exact dosage of marijuana to consume, proven and tested by a doctor. 

All and all, if marijuana is universally made legal for medical purposes, so many lives have the potential to be changed. Medical marijuana has the ability to save a patient up to 1,000’s of dollars in medical bills, since marijuana is drastically cheaper than getting prescriptions filled however many times needed for a specific sickness. Furthermore, if Larry would not have been introduced to medical marijuana, he would still be paying over $100,000 for medication and treatment. Also, the 5-year-old girl, Charlotte, with epilepsy would most likely not be alive today if her doctors would not have taken the time to reach out and find a way to safely use marijuana to save her life. In fact, marijuana was their last resort, but due to the doctor’s discovery on the connection of marijuana, dyskinesia, and epileptic seizures, the next patients that contract the same illness now have a cure and an alternative from living a life consumed with constant seizures every other minute of their lives. This legalization has all the power to cause great changes in a number of people lives; once the correct limitations and boundaries are finally established to protect the people using and not using (but effected), hopefully this country will see a rise in states legalizing marijuana for medical purposes.
