Pubdate: Tue, 20 Jan 2015
Source: Chicago Sun-Times (IL)
Copyright: 2015 Sun-Times Media, LLC
Contact: http://mapinc.org/url/5QwXAJWY
Website: http://www.suntimes.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/81
Author: Sue Ontiveros

MEDICAL POT IS NOT ABOUT CHEECH & CHONG OR DRUG CARTELS

What a shame that it's not looking good for medical marijuana in Illinois.

Illinois became the 20th state to allow medical marijuana under a 
pilot program approved Aug. 1, 2013. Yet, the process dragged on, and 
former Gov. Pat Quinn left office without finalizing it. Now our 
current governor has said, "I'm concerned about the process," so the 
waiting game continues.

Here's why I think the situation is where it is: too many people in 
Illinois are letting their past ideas about marijuana cloud the issue.

For a lot of people - especially baby boomers - when they hear the 
words medical marijuana, the word "medical" falls on deaf ears. What 
pops into their collective heads are remembrances of people sitting 
in a circle passing around a joint. That or images of the munchies 
and Cheech and Chong. All they can see is the fun and games of it.

For others, they're so worried that they, too, forget the word 
"medical." All they can think of is the drug dealers who've disrupted 
their neighborhoods and turned them into places where people drive up 
to make illegal buys at all hours. All they can visualize is danger, crime.

But if you've had a family member with cancer, multiple sclerosis or 
epilepsy, or you yourself are the one suffering, the view is entirely 
different. All you see is the word "medical."

You see marijuana as the medicinal relief it is. You wish others 
could realize these delays are just keeping medicine from those who 
need it, really sick people. Medical marijuana is just what its name 
says it is, not a party favor or something lethal to a community.

During this prolonged wait, I often have thought of my father, in 
those last months when the cancer had entered his bones, making 
everything so much more painful. You'd try to help him get out of a 
chair or assist him walking, and one touch to the wrong spot would 
leave him in agony.

Back then I broached the idea of using marijuana to ease his pain. 
(It's not like the illegal stuff would be hard to find.) But he 
refused; didn't want to break the law. Something might change, he 
figured, and then we could look into it. He died before the pilot 
program was ever legalized.

Dan Linn, executive director of Illinois NORML (National Organization 
to Reform Marijuana Laws), agrees there's a lot of "misinformation 
and prejudice" surrounding marijuana's use for sick patients.

Linn describes the rules of tight security the dispensaries would be 
required to follow; the only ones even allowed on the premises would 
be registered patients or caregivers (both of whom would have 
state-issued cards to prove their eligibility). No card, no 
admittance, according to Linn, whom I talked to last week.

So there's no need to position these dispensaries in remote locations 
as so many have recommended, again something that slowed this 
process. Why make it so hard for sick people to get medicine to ease 
their pain?

To become eligible, patients went through the necessary hoops, popped 
for their own fingerprinting and paid a $150 annual fee. So far 
they've gotten nothing. For most the renewal fee will come up before 
a program even begins. Does that seem fair?

The statute is called the Compassionate Use of Medical Cannabis Pilot 
Program Act, a way to bring relief and comfort to sick Illinois 
residents. These continued delays tell me again a word has been 
forgotten: compassion.
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MAP posted-by: Jay Bergstrom