Plight of the desperately ill deserves marijuana access

October 12, 1998 - Everett Herald - newmedia@heraldnet.com

The difficult and serious question of medical marijuana is back.

Voters will decide this November whether to approve a state law allowing limited medical use of marijuana for patients with terminal or serious illnesses.

This is a much improved initiative measure that treats the question with the thoughtfulness that was scandalously absent last year. But because federal laws can't be removed by state action, vexing questions will remain whether or not Washingtonians support medical use of marijuana. Indeed, the federal questions limit how well the measure can be written.

Despite the problems that will remain, voters will nevertheless do well to say yes to Initiative 692 as a matter of imperfect compassion and support for the very sick and dying.

Voters should do so only with some careful understandings of the opposing views. The state medical association, for instance, doesn't support the initiative. What evidence there is about marijuana's medical effectiveness has not been subjected to the usual federal reviews. There is no quality control for any marijuana that will be obtained by patients. Indeed, opponents can reasonably speak of the initiative as abandoning the normal Federal Drug Administration process for approving medicines.

Yet, there is no real prospect for the FDA to move forward anytime soon, at least without pressure from the states. This initiative is miles ahead of the measures passed in recent years by California and Arizona. Initiative 692 defines carefully who can use marijuana for medical purposes. Principally, those are cancer and AIDS patients, chronic pain sufferers and people with serious muscle diseases, such as multiple sclerosis. The measure also attempts to prevent the circus atmosphere around California "buying clubs" by saying that no person may provide medical marijuana to more than one person.

In most circumstances, there are many traditional medical alternatives to marijuana. But society also ought to be as supportive as possible toward desperately ill individuals for whom those treatments aren't working. Compassion ought to be the guiding principle when patients are dying. That's especially true for a state that has rejected assisted suicide.

If initiative supporters are being honest, this measure is not about legalizing marijuana. Legalization would be a horrible idea, widening use of a drug with some extraordinarily bad effects on the mental state of users. If somehow passage of the initiative were to be used to promote wider recreational use of marijuana, the Legislature would have an absolute duty to amend or wipe out the initiative, immediately.

In fact, we would not support a yes vote if we weren't prepared to ask the Legislature to deal with any problems that may occur. Legislators are notoriously reluctant to overturn any initiative. But it is reasonable to hope that legislators would act if drug abuse or crime were to increase because of this measure. If legislators hear conflicting assessments, our advice would be to listen to those who know the problems best -- police and prosecutors.

If the medical marijuana initiative can be implemented responsibly, however, young people are capable of understanding that marijuana is being approved only for the desperately ill. They can see that first hand by watching a beloved older family member suffer from an illness. In such an instance, the medical use of marijuana might help young people disassociate the drug from any false perception of glamour.

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