Recategorize marijuana

Given the recent popularity of legalizing marijuana and its known medicinal qualities, it’s time for the Drug Enforcement Administration to reclassify it from a Schedule I to, at the very least, a Schedule III or IV drug. Schedule I drugs are defined as drugs with no “currently accepted medical use,” and are classified as the most dangerous drugs on all drug schedules.

To place marijuana in this class, which includes heroin and LSD, is absurd, antiquated and hypocritical, at best. Cocaine, for example, is a Schedule II drug.

When the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services holds a patent proving the medicinal uses of marijuana (issued October 2007: “Cannabinoids as Antioxidants and Neuroprotectants”) and thousands of doctors recommend medical marijuana to their patients, the DEA and Food and Drug Administration need to take a hard look at an easy remedy: Do the common-sense and right thing; recategorize marijuana in the less dangerous schedule where it belongs.

Joe Speranzi

Spokane