In a new study from the University of Georgia, two researchers have come up with some mind numbing figures about the efficacy of medical marijuana and its opposition by pharmaceutical companies. As reported in the Washington Post:

… in the 17 states with a medical-marijuana law in place by 2013, prescriptions for painkillers and other classes of drugs fell sharply compared with states that did not have a medical-marijuana law. The drops were quite significant:

The study was based on Medicare part D spending, and seniors are the demographic least likely to adopt marijuana over traditional prescriptions, so the financial hit to pharmaceutical companies is probably going to be greater than the study calculates. Nevertheless,

They found that about $165 million was saved in the 17 medical marijuana states in 2013. In a back-of-the-envelope calculation, the estimated annual Medicare prescription savings would be nearly half a billion dollars if all 50 states were to implement similar programs.

A half a billion dollars is just the tip of the iceberg when counting its use by the younger segments of the population. So the pharmaceutical industry continues its opposition to the lifting of Cannabis as a Schedule 1 drug, lobbying the administration to keep it listed among the most dangerous, of drugs, all because they fear for their bottom line. They seek to bolster revenues by synthesizing a product that is inferior to the plant that grows in nature, Taking a page from the climate deniers in the fossil fuel industry, they fund anti-marijuana researchers and their questionable studies whose only purpose is to confuse and obfuscate.

The industry also puts pressure on their minions in Congress to continue the failed war on drugs, guaranteeing a steady source of clients for the prison industrial complex, estimated at 750,000 people annually in the US. They are joined by their fellow travelers in the police departments and prosecutors’ offices that use civil forfeiture laws to fund their operations. So many people are profiting from the misery of others that sane marijuana policy decisions become impossible.

This is just another example of how the profit motive in our society trumps human well being at almost every turn. But it doesn’t have to be that way. For example, what would be the effect of the substitution of pot for oxycontin, not only on the individual patient, but also on the reduction of death and suffering caused by the epidemic of opioid addiction that is sweeping the country? Or how many lives could be spared that are now being ruined by senseless incarceration, for the use of what is at worse a harmless weed, and at best a miracle drug? And what would be the overall improvement in the health of the general population from an easy to produce, safe and increasingly effective drug? These are the issues we need to include in the discussion.

Jill Stein has stated that as a practicing MD, the only thing she finds dangerous about marijuana is the fact that it is illegal. It is time for this lunacy to end.