There are still 14 states without medical cannabis programs. According to reform organization Marijuana Policy Project, that is 14 too many.

In Alabama, where a medical cannabis bill now sits on Republican Gov. Kay Ivey’s desk, House lawmakers spent nearly 10 hours filibustering its progress on Tuesday, before more debate and a final vote resulted in passage by a supermajority, 68-34, on Thursday.

What were the arguments against helping people with qualifying health conditions get the relief they need?

One Republican opponent said he worried that medical use could be a “gateway” to an adult-use program, which would change the very fabric of who Alabamians are as a state. Other opponents were concerned that cannabis is not approved through the U.S. Food and Drug Administration.

But those reservations were met with the fact that the COVID-19 vaccines are not FDA-approved either, while pharmaceutical opioids, like OxyContin and fentanyl, were approved more than 20 years ago to treat pain.

“What I find interesting is that in this medical cannabis debate, who exactly we’re guiding people towards if we continue to deny access to medical cannabis,” Alabama state Rep. Chris England said on the House floor this week.

Rep. Laura Hall talked about how her son, Ato, died of AIDS in the 1990s, after he could no longer endure his azidothymidine (AZT) antiretroviral medication. She introduced a medical cannabis bill to the House two decades ago.

“I’ve always believed if there had just been something else that he could have taken, something else that would have helped him, he might have been living today,” Hall said.

In addition to pain and HIV/AIDS, medical cannabis is often recommended for those suffering from anxiety, autism, cancer, Crohn’s disease, epilepsy, fibromyalgia, menopause or premenstrual syndrome, multiple sclerosis, persistent nausea, post-traumatic stress disorder, sickle cell anemia, spasticity, and Tourette syndrome, among other ailments.

While people’s health deteriorates under those conditions, other Alabama lawmakers also voted against the bill because there wasn’t a dosing limit on milligrams of THC in oral products like gummies, or there wasn’t a clause to shift distribution rights from dispensaries to pharmacies should the federal government reschedule cannabis’ drug status.

Fortunately for potential patients, lawmakers in Alabama sided with the constituents they represent—nine in 10 Americans favor some form of cannabis legalization—as well as health care professionals. Seventy percent of 450 responding physicians from diverse medical specialties who are members of the Medical Association of the State of Alabama support medical cannabis legalization, according to an April 2021 survey funded by the University of Alabama at Birmingham Lister Hill Center for Health Policy.

Continuing to criminalize the medical use of cannabis only prevents seriously ill patients from getting the relief they need and deserve. 

-Tony Lange, Associate Editor