BLUE CHRISTMAS

I wish I had some cheery Christmas story for you tonight but as I'm sure by now you have all heard it was coal in Canada's cannabis stocking from their Supreme Court. I thought it was rather a Grinch stole Christmas move to announce a negative decision just before the holiday. Hardly in the spirit of the season when they could have waited until January. I only hope that Martin follows through in reintroducing the decrim legislation then. I'm counting on his wife Sheila to keep him on track.

Medical marijuana remains legal there however and Dr. Mark Ware of McGill University in Montreal has started a clinical trial on the therapeutic effects of cannabis in chronic pain cases. Patients are hoping the study, with early results expected in 2005, will facilitate wider spread acceptance of cannabis as a medicine.

Five thousand years of therapeutic value can't be wrong but I also think we need to remember that along with its medicinal benefits that its use as a consciousness expanding substance has also been practiced for that long.

With that in mind, the last word goes to a fairly recent study from a well known corporate provider of medical care.

The Kaiser Permanente Study

"Marijuana Use and Mortality" April 1997 American Journal of Public Health".

"Relatively few adverse clinical effects from the chronic use of marijuana have been documented in humans. However, the criminalization of marijuana use may itself be a health hazard, since it may expose the users to violence and criminal activity."

Translated into common speech this means that it costs them more to provide care for the victims of the prohibition than it does to care for the effects of the use of the prohibited substances. Mark my words, cost control will win the fight for legalization in the end.