Report: Marijuana may be medically useful

The Associated Press

WASHINGTON -- Marijuana has medical benefits for people suffering from cancer and AIDS and should undergo scientific trials to see how it works best, a panel of medical experts concluded Wednesday in a report to the federal government.

The drug remains illegal under federal law, despite ballot measures approving its use in Alaska, Arizona, California, Nevada, Oregon and Washington. The new report is sharpening debate over its use. The Institute of Medicine, an affiliate of the National Academy of Sciences, said marijuana's active ingredients can ease pain, nausea and vomiting. It urged the development of a standard way to use the drug, such as an inhaler. The conclusion was greeted warmly by most marijuana advocates, but opponents said they worry the report will encourage marijuana use. "Let us waste no more time in providing this medication through legal, medical channels to all the patients whose lives may be saved," said Daniel Zingale of AIDS Action. But Rep. Bill McCollum, R-Fla., who led the fight to get the House to condemn medical marijuana last fall, said he is "deeply concerned" the report might encourage people to smoke marijuana. It is known some of the chemicals in marijuana can be useful, he acknowledged, but their place is in inhalers or pill form. "We should not sanction smoked marijuana because there is no way to control that," McCollum said. "Providing good medicine -- not marijuana -- is the compassionate response to patients' pain and illnesses," said Robert Maginnis of the conservative Family Research Council. He insisted doctors have other medicines to treat any ailment that marijuana can help. White House drug adviser Barry McCaffrey said the findings are unlikely to send pharmaceutical companies scrambling to do research on marijuana. "Our experience is there is little market interest," McCaffrey said. Ironically, the new analysis was requested and paid for by McCaffrey's White House Office of National Drug Control Policy, after an expert panel formed by the National Institutes of Health concluded in 1997 that some patients could be helped by marijuana, mainly cancer and AIDS victims.

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