Welcome to the Medical Marijuana Action Network!
Our main goal is to urge support for Ohio's House Bill 478, the Ohio Medical Compassion Act. You can do so by simply following that link and sending an email to the specified Representatives. You can read the full legislation here.
This bill seeks to enact statewide legal protections shielding those seriously ill patients who use cannabis therapeutically with a doctor's recommendation from criminal prosecution. At the same time, it will not alter or interfere with already existing state laws discouraging the non-medical, recreational use of marijuana.
The use of marijuana as medicine is a public health issue; it should not be part of the war on drugs. According to a recent national survey of U.S. physicians conducted for the American Society of Addiction Medicine, nearly half of all doctors with opinions support legalizing cannabis as a medicine.
Some 80 state and national health care organizations, including the American Nurses Association, American Public Health Association and The New England Journal of Medicine, support immediate, legal patient access to medical cannabis.
Most recently, the largest association of doctors of internal medicine and the second largest medical association in the country, the American College of Physicians, released a policy paper in support of medical cannabis, stating, "The ACP strongly urges protection from criminal or civil penalties for patients who use medical marijuana as permitted under state laws." Also, in November, the American Medical Association resolved that marijuana's status as a federal Schedule I controlled substance be reviewed with the goal of facilitating the conduct of clinical research and development of cannabinoid-based medicines."
Fourteen states - Alaska, California, Colorado, Hawaii, Maine, Michigan, Montana, Nevada, New Jersey, New Mexico, Oregon, Rhode Island, Vermont and Washington - have enacted laws protecting medical marijuana patients from state prosecution. These laws are operating primarily as lawmakers intended and have not led to widespread abuses among adolescents or adult recreational users.
We believe it is unconscionable to deny this effective medicine to sick and dying patients and strongly urge you to support the medical use of marijuana in Ohio.
Since it's inception in 1996, the Media Awareness Project (MAP) has been an indispensable resource for anyone with a serious interest in drug policy. To that effect, we have included several of their Medicinal Cannabis newsfeeds below. These are updated frequently by MAP, and there may be duplicate stories in different categories.
Ohio Medicinal Cannabis News
United States Medicinal Cannabis News
Global Medicinal Cannabis News
