Pubdate: Wed, 08 Apr 2009 Source: Daily Herald (Arlington Heights, IL) Copyright: 2009 The Daily Herald Company Contact: http://www.dailyherald.com/ Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/107 Author: Paula Coughlan ALL DRUGS HAVE SIDE EFFECTS Can we assume from John Stossel's column of March 26 that he is one of the "adults" who freely ingests whatever he wants, feeling he's still somehow responsible for his actions? Taking drugs makes people act irresponsibly, causing accidents, harming families by depriving them of coherent and responsibly working adults. It is in fact an irresponsible act to use drugs. His column discusses the medical use of marijuana. Since marijuana is no stronger or dangerous than many prescription drugs on the market, and helps people who are ill with cancer or glaucoma, this is not unreasonable. But I myself have borderline glaucoma. My eye professionals tried me on five different prescription eyedrops, all of which caused severe enough side effects that they took me off of them. When I asked my ophthalmologist what he thought of marijuana for glaucoma he told me: "marijuana is another drug and there are no drugs without side effects. Increased heart rate and mental alterations are but two." There is now a laser treatment for glaucoma that is 85 percent successful. Much better than a drug that would make me apathetic to life. I once ended up in the ER because I was taking something for acid reflux and three nonprescription ibuprofen pills each day for arthritis pain. This small amount of simple drugs was causing fluid retention that indicated possible kidney problems. I was instructed by the ER doctor to stop ingesting any kind of pill because I had just gotten extremely lucky that I came in when I did. The lesson is that there are no drugs in existence that don't have side effects. I'm disappointed in John's attitude that adults should be free to ingest whatever they want. We may not have found the answers yet, but letting people make shipwrecks out of the lives around them sure isn't it. Paula Coughlan Elburn - --- MAP posted-by: Jay Bergstrom