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Medical marijuana, for babies and their desperate parents


Because you didn't do a good job of making it clear what the article is actually about, I'll do it for you. Toddlers are NOT smoking or consuming marijuana in any way, shape, or form that could possibly get them high. They're using cannabis oil, high in CBD and low in THC (no high) in order to treat childhood seizure syndromes like Dravet's syndrome.

As an example:
Marijuana stops child's severe seizures - CNN.com
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Charlotte Figi has Dravet's. She used to have 300+ seizures a day, she was completely unfunctional and had to be placed into a medically induced coma just to give her body enough rest not to die. Her parents tried every modern legal medical treatment for Dravet's, which very often involve highly dangerous drugs with massive side effects. After years of trying, they eventually tried cannabis oil. Her seizures have dropped from 300+ a day to 0-1 a week. She now has a normal life and can function like a child should.

As someone who had childhood seizures I sympathize with her more than most. I think it's atrocious that our country still refuses to accept the massive evidence of numerous medical benefits to cannabis and its extracts. It's time to get the government out of the way and let doctors prescribe the medicine they should and want to prescribe.
 
I think it's atrocious that our country still refuses to accept the massive evidence of numerous medical benefits to cannabis and its extracts. It's time to get the government out of the way and let doctors prescribe the medicine they should and want to prescribe.
I agree but I think we need to recognise that it’s not only (some in) government acting to block progress. There are many proponents of “medical marijuana” who resist the idea of making it a formally proscribed medicine. They want it to just be free for anyone to use any way they want, because they either want to use this as a route to legalise recreational use and/or have an objection to formalised medicine in general.
 
I agree but I think we need to recognise that it’s not only (some in) government acting to block progress. There are many proponents of “medical marijuana” who resist the idea of making it a formally proscribed medicine. They want it to just be free for anyone to use any way they want, because they either want to use this as a route to legalise recreational use and/or have an objection to formalised medicine in general.

Why shouldn't it be both? Humans have been using cannabis for medicine and recreation for thousands of years. At a minimum we shouldn't be inserting the government between doctors and patients when making medical decisions. It's ridiculous that we have medical refugees like the Figis who have to leave their states for another just so they can get their daughter the medicine she needs to live.
 
Why shouldn't it be both?
I’m not saying it can’t be both but they’re entirely different prospects that require entirely different sets of arguments for (and indeed against) them. I’m objecting to the people trying to use support for one to sneak the other in without having to make any kind of convincing argument to support it. As I originally suggested, I think this is actually damaging the prospect for the full use of marijuana-based medicines in the mainstream clinical environment. “Medical marijuana” has been given a bad name because its image as a thin cover for recreational sale and use (with some justification).

At a minimum we shouldn't be inserting the government between doctors and patients when making medical decisions.
All medical decisions or just ones involving marijuana? There is clearly such a thing as too much government intervention but there’s also such a thing as too little. I see nothing wrong with a level of legal and regulatory intervention to protect both patients and doctors alike, especially when the patients are vulnerable such as children.
 
I’m not saying it can’t be both but they’re entirely different prospects that require entirely different sets of arguments for (and indeed against) them. I’m objecting to the people trying to use support for one to sneak the other in without having to make any kind of convincing argument to support it. As I originally suggested, I think this is actually damaging the prospect for the full use of marijuana-based medicines in the mainstream clinical environment. “Medical marijuana” has been given a bad name because its image as a thin cover for recreational sale and use (with some justification).

All medical decisions or just ones involving marijuana? There is clearly such a thing as too much government intervention but there’s also such a thing as too little. I see nothing wrong with a level of legal and regulatory intervention to protect both patients and doctors alike, especially when the patients are vulnerable such as children.

Shouldn't the burden of proof for locking people in cages for owning a plant be placed on those making the claim? We have no reason to believe that cannabis is a public menace and science and experience shows it's the exact opposite. Current criminalization has absolutely nothing to do with protecting Americans or their health, so I say any argument with any motivation under any circumstances is fair game. If we get to recreational legalization through medical legalization, so be it.

There is no rational reason to lock someone in a cage for owning a plant.
 
Shouldn't the burden of proof for locking people in cages for owning a plant be placed on those making the claim?
Personally I’m fairly neutral on recreation use but my whole point is that isn’t a debate for this thread. Why would you want to focus on that when the thread topic is the treatment of seriously ill children?
 
Personally I’m fairly neutral on recreation use but my whole point is that isn’t a debate for this thread. Why would you want to focus on that when the thread topic is the treatment of seriously ill children?

What the actual ****? In post #3 you were complaining that people making arguments for medical marijuana also secretly want recreational marijuana legalized. I simply responded with the equivalent of "WHO THE **** CARES!?" You don't have a rational reason to be opposed to either.
 
What the actual ****? In post #3 you were complaining that people making arguments for medical marijuana also secretly want recreational marijuana legalized. I simply responded with the equivalent of "WHO THE **** CARES!?" You don't have a rational reason to be opposed to either.
I’ve no specific objection to recreational use in general but I do think there are a number of practical issues to address in making it workable. They are very different practical issues to making medicines from the various marijuana extracts. I think the former can present social, political and legal distractions to the latter and given the relative importance, I think an obsessive focus on supporting recreational use without considering clinical use is inappropriate.

The direction of our discussion kind of proves my point. I didn’t want to get in to a discussion about the rights and wrongs of recreational use in this thread yet here we are all the same.
 
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