Pubdate: Thu, 21 Feb 2002
Source: Post-Standard, The (NY)
Section: Neighbors
Copyright: 2002, Syracuse Post-Standard
Contact:  http://www.syracuse.com/syrnewspapers/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/686
Author: Nicolas Eyle
Note: Title by MAP Editor

REGARDING THE DANGERS OF MARIJUANA

To the Editor;

It was interesting to see the full page article on the dangers of marijuana 
in your paper Monday morning. Reading it I noticed that nearly all the 
information was provided by NIDA, the government agency that has been 
providing the medical arguments in support of prohibition for years. There 
was no mention of the studies done by countless organizations around the 
world, many government sponsored, that have caused the international 
community to move in the direction of decriminalizing marijuana. Holland, 
Belgium, Italy, Spain, Portugal, Switzerland, Canada, Mexico, the U.K, 
France, even Ukraine either have legalized personal possession of marijuana 
or are on the verge of doing so. The US press however, still allows such 
propaganda about the dangers of marijuana to go unchallenged far too often.

After the Canadian government recently approved a system to provide 
marijuana for those who need it for medical reasons the editor of the 
Canadian Medical Journal, Dr. John Hoey, stated that "Our view is that the 
government should probably take a little bit more bold step and 
decriminalize it. It turns out that it is really quite an innocuous drug..."

Nicolas Eyle, executive director

ReconsiDer: forum on drug policy

www.reconsider.org
- ---
MAP posted-by: Beth