More on the Medical Marijuana Scam

The science on marijuana has developed greatly since 1999 when the government funded National Academy of Medicine (then called the Institute of Medicine) reassured us that both marijuana and prescription opioids posed little societal danger. Oops! In January 2017 the NAM published a book-sized report outlining the state of the science on marijuana, including medical marijuana. It now admits that regular marijuana use causes psychosis: “The association between cannabis use and development of a psychotic disorder is supported by data synthesized in several good-quality systematic reviews. The magnitude of this association is moderate to large and appears to be dose dependent.” In fact, various studies around the world agree that regular cannabis use increases the risk of psychosis (hallucinations, delusions and paranoia) by about 300%, and that rises to 400% in those with family history of psychosis. Moreover, the evidence shows that marijuana causes violence even more than alcohol does, and that when that violence is psychotic the crimes can be truly horrifying. Don’t believe it? Of course not, because you have been sold a bill of goods by the mainstream media. This propaganda has led to a doubling of recreational marijuana use since 2000 in the U.S. The same thing occurred in Canada, but it did not occur in Britain because a stream of studies published by the Institute of Psychiatry in London outlining the real risks of cannabis regularly appeared in the press and was covered by the media at large.

The truth about marijuana has been known for centuries and has been documented by physicians throughout history and around the world for those willing to look. I recommend the book Tell Your Children by Alex Berenson for both a review of that history and for an insightful analysis of current published evidence. Berenson is a New York Times reporter and his wife is a psychiatrist in New York; it was she who enlightened him on the subject. Berenson also reviews the history of the marijuana legalization movement in America and describes how the leaders of the cannabis lobby came up with idea of selling the idea of cannabis as medicine – the thin edge of the wedge – to achieve full legalization of recreational marijuana. And it worked, with more than a little help from the media. Now most Americans believe that marijuana is medicine. It isn’t.

Marijuana has been approved by the FDA for nothing because the chemical ingredients and dosage vary from plant to plant. Marinol is a pill that contains tetrahydrocannabinol (THC ) which is the psychoactive component of marijuana; it is FDA approved for nausea and weight loss in cancer patients. Cannabidiol is a component of marijuana that does not cause a high and is FDA approved for muscle cramps in multiple sclerosis and for a rare form of seizure disorder.

To be continued….

– Gary Gallo, MD