Year: 1997
Type: article
Abstract: To the Editor: With respect to your editorial on the medicinal use of marijuana (Jan.30 issue), 1 I made it a priority, as the first director of the National Institute on Drug Abuse (1973 to 1978), to investigate the health effects of smoking marijuana and to report on them regularly to the Congress and the public.Particular chemical constituents of smoked marijuana may have medical benefits, but it is unthinkable that in the closing decade of the 20th century, American medicine would return to prescribing smoked leaves for any condition.The history of the past hundred years in medicine has been to identify chemicals that offer benefits for specific problems and then to make those chemicals available in stable, known doses.The proper mechanism for sorting out claims of safety and efficacy was established by the Pure Food and Drug Act in 1906. . . .
Source: New England Journal of Medicine
Language: English
Field: Medicine
Domain: Health Sciences
Open Access status: bronze
OpenAlex ID: W1965456098