They reminded me that we doctors are at the front lines of the scourge of gun violence, and that to remain silent as this threat to public health continues unabated would be no different than for an oncologist or a cardiologist to stay mum on the dangers of smoking.
via At the E.R., Bearing Witness to Gun Violence – NYTimes.com.
This coming from a practitioner of a profession that kills 10 times more people than all the murderers in the US, rings hollow and hypocritical. It doubles down when he actually uses the Kellerman study to prop up his “argument.”
Physician, heal thyself!
“…an oncologist or a cardiologist to stay mum on the dangers of smoking.”
Yet they remain ‘mum’ on the cancer fighting BENEFITS of cannabis.
Funny that.
There are not enough un-biased studies available on Marijuana to come to a real conclusion. Every study done so far has been funded by either the pro-legalization or anti-legalization sides, and presents data with a clear favorable slant to whichever group funded or performed the study.
My stance is if it’s legal, keep it legal. If it’s banned, keep it banned. Either way, there is not enough information to justify changing the rules, because odds are if we opt to charge in one direction, that will be the wrong direction.
Keep in mind, please, that tobacco smoke used to be prescribed for asthmatics, and opium was the pain-killer of choice for the wealthy and intelligent.
nay…can definitely not agree with that opening sentence of the 2nd paragraph. That one is a blanket statement. Alcohol was once illegal remember. if they’d kept it that way….bad, bad, bad. I don’t know about the cancer study one….but having seen first hand in the past around friends with true ADD/ADHD how it helped them…at a fraction of the cost of prescriptions…
Alcohol was originally legal and then made illegal. That kind of change is exactly what I’m advising against. Now that marijuana has been legalized across the US, if it turns out to have nightmarish long-term or societal effects, it will be impossible to make it illegal.
Also, alcohol is somewhat easier to produce underground than marijuana plants, without the aid of law-enforcement and neighbors intentionally turning a blind eye.
Marijuana used to be legal (or, at least, not illegal). Cocaine used to be legal (or not illegal) — in fact, it was one of the active ingredients in what is now the most popular non-water beverage in the world, Coca Cola.
As with the alcohol ban giving rise to Big Organized Crime, making these readily available (still, today, and for cheap!) products illegal to possess and distribute has directly led A) to their flourishing throughout all levels of our society, B) to wars with Mexico (see: US-Mexico border/illegal immigration), Afghanistan (from their perspective: opium poppy/economics/control of region’s oil) and on the streets of our cities, and C) to the police state which we are steadily hurtling toward.
It kills me to have to make the “It’s not the product, it’s the user” argument to people who should clearly understand that guns don’t kill people — people kill people, sometimes with guns.
It still blows my mind that they don’t use checklists in surgery.
More and more are, actually. Anesthesiologists pretty much use them religiously now.