Portal:Cannabis/Selected article/Week 19, 2008

Medical cannabis refers to the use of the drug cannabis as a physician-recommended herbal therapy, most notably as an antiemetic.

There are many studies regarding the use of cannabis in a medicinal context. Cannabis was listed in the United States Pharmacopeia from 1850 until 1942. The United States federal government does not currently recognize any legitimate medical use, although there are currently seven patients receiving cannabis for their various illnesses through the Compassionate Investigational New Drug program that was closed to new patients in 1991 by the George H. W. Bush administration. Francis L. Young, an administrative law judge with the United States Drug Enforcement Agency, in 1988, declared that "in its natural form, [cannabis] is one of the safest therapeutically active substances known." However, smoked cannabis is today not approved by the United States Food and Drug Administration (FDA). Twelve state laws currently allow for the medicinal use of cannabis but the United States Supreme Court has later ruled that the federal government has the right to regulate and criminalize marijuana also in these states, even for medical purposes.