New rules coming: Canadian medicinal pot

Canada’s rules for using medicinal marijuana, medicinal pot, may be changing in order to clarify *where* registered medicinal marijuana users may smoke.

According to this article at Canada.com, Rules may be tightened on smoking medical marijuana , people with chronic diseases who use marijuana to relieve symptoms are being challenged even by federal workers if they’re found smoking in public. One gentleman had his pot taken from him and trampled by a park employee while the man was out hiking. He uses the pot to relieve his cancer symptoms.

I can see both sides of the story – and then some. First, I believe that medicinal pot is a right, just like any other medication. I don’t buy the “it’s not safe to carry pot in pharmacies” story because those pharmacies carry medications much, much stronger than pot. I don’t buy the “it’s a slippery slope” theory because if people are dying of cancer or AIDS, what slippery slope may they fall on?

But, to look at the issue at hand, where can they smoke:

The government’s point of view makes sense . Unless you are a registered user of medicinal marijuana, it’s an illegal substance still. If registered users smoke outside a restaurant or store, or in a park, people passing by may wonder why that person can smoke, but they can’t. The gov’t may feel that the people could become targets for those wanting to take their marijuana, and so on.

The registered smokers also make sense. As they say in the article, there aren’t restrictions for other people taking medications as to where they can do so, so why should there be a restriction on registered smokers? Should they not go out for the day, taking advantage of feeling better, for fear of needing their pot but not being allowed to use it?

What do you think? I’ve written about medicinal marijuana several times over at Help My Hurt before it was retired. I don’t feel it’s anything worse than the medications I used to give to patients. These medications ranged from morphine to opium and belladona. You can’t tell me pot is worse than those!

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Images: Newscom, MorgueFile