Lester Grinspoon

About the author: Lester Grinspoon is Associate Professor Emeritus of psychiatry at Harvard Medical School.

Cannabis has long been recognized as an effective medicinal. In the nineteenth century, solutions containing cannabis were used to relieve pain and induce sleep. Early in the twentieth century, the medical attractiveness of marijuana waned as a disinformation campaign against its recreational use spread. After the 1970s, the medical uses of cannabis were rediscovered when patients undergoing chemotherapy found that smoking marijuana relieved the nausea and vomiting that are common side effects of the treatment. Currently, marijuana has been found useful in treating glaucoma, AIDS wasting syndrome, osteoarthritis, convulsive disorders, and other chronic ailments. The government and the mainstream medical community, however, overestimate the dangers of marijuana smoke and are reluctant to make it available as a prescribed medicine. Although cannabis derivatives are...