"Mr.
Justice Minister, let's decriminalize the possession of small amounts of
marijuana for personal use."
That's the final line -- and the bottom line
-- of this week's editorial in the Canadian Medical Association
Journal. Written in response to Health Canada's announcement last month
of new medical marijuana regulations, the editorial called Health Canada's
move "a step in the right direction," but said "a bolder stride is
needed."
"Our view is that the government should probably take a
little bit more bold step and decriminalize it," the journal's editor, Dr.
John Hoey, told the Toronto Star. "It turns out that it is really quite
an innocuous drug, probably with the exception of tars and things, which then
make it similar to tobacco," the editorialist explained.
In the
editorial, Hoey elaborated: "The possession of small quantities for
personal use should be decriminalized. The minimal negative health
effects of moderate use would be attested to by the estimated 1.5 million
Canadians who smoke marijuana for recreational purposes. The real harm
is the legal and social fallout. About half of all drug arrests in
Canada are for simple possession of small amounts of marijuana: about
31,299 convictions in 1995 alone. Many lead to jail terms or fines,
and all result in that indelible social tattoo: a criminal record. This
means that for anyone who's ever been caught with a stash in his or her
pocket, the question 'Have you ever had a criminal conviction?' during a job
application or medical school interview can force higher aspirations to go up
in a puff of smoke.
"The decriminalization of marijuana possession for
personal use does not mean making marijuana 'legal' or letting it be sold
in every schoolyard. It does mean that possession of small
amounts for personal use would become a civil offense, like a
traffic violation, not a criminal one. The provisions of
Canada's Contraventions Act make this a relatively simple
legislative task."
Hoey told the Star he expected no negative fallout
from Canadian doctors, which is not surprising given that the Canadian
Medical Association, the journal's publisher, has already endorsed
the decriminalization of marijuana.
"My hunch is that doctors would
generally agree, and certainly public health doctors, who would worry about
this, that the harms of criminalizing marijuana use far outweigh the harms of
smoking a bit of marijuana," Hoey said.
Hoey also used the editorial
pulpit to urge his fellow physicians to move quickly on medical
marijuana. "About 400,000 Canadians use cannabis for medical reasons,"
he wrote. "Professional organizations such as the CMA must move quickly
to issue guidelines for physicians who, increasingly, will be asked
for advice by their patients."
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