Marijuana Smoke Listed as Cause Of Cancer

Here's a swell idea: Instead of referring to cigarettes as addictive, cancer-causing death sticks, let's describe them as medicine. After all, for those who are addicted, aren't cigarettes just like "medical marijuana" in that they can, at least temporarily, calm nerves and even sharpen concentration and memory? That's medicine, baby.

That's absurd, you say. Tobacco is responsible for 438,000 American deaths every year. Preventable deaths.

You're right. And therein lies a dirty little hypocrisy about "medical marijuana."

The California Office of Environmental Health Hazard Assessment this month added marijuana smoke to the official list of substances known by the state to cause cancer. The state is required to maintain this list under Proposition 65, approved by nearly two-thirds of voters in 1986. The measure also requires businesses to post warnings about chemicals they use that are on the list. You've probably seen the warnings on gas pumps.

The agency said its science advisory board "determined that marijuana smoke was clearly shown, through scientifically valid testing according to generally accepted principles, to cause cancer." A spokesman said the agency's review of more than 30 scientific papers showed that marijuana smoke contains 33 of the same harmful chemicals as tobacco smoke.

The addition of marijuana to the list probably won't achieve much, other than to presumably require dispensaries of "medical marijuana" to post warning signs.

But it does show the folly of the drug as medicine — a nonsensical notion that was approved by voters in 1996 as Proposition 215.

Marijuana is not a drug that has been tested, approved and certified safe by the Food and Drug Administration — or any other credible organization.

This is not a "medicine" for which science has determined just what illnesses or symptoms marijuana should be used as treatment. Or what a therapeutic dosage might be. Or how it should be administered. Or which strain of marijuana - say, California Bud or Hawaii Maui Waui - might be best for which illness. Or whether there are safe alternatives (There are).

But what the heck. A week from today, San Diego County will start giving out "medical marijuana" cards, just like other California counties have done for some time as required by a law enacted by the Legislature in 2003 as a spinoff of Proposition 215.

So when you "patients" go down to the county health services complex — that's right, the health services complex — to get your medical marijuana card, just keep saying this to yourself: Medicine, not cancer. Medicine, not cancer.

Then go get your marijuana. And have a cigarette. Might as well go for the double dose.

REPRINTED FROM THE SAN DIEGO UNION-TRIBUNE.

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