Posted December 2, 2002
Analysis by Richard Cowan

Yesterday was World AIDS Day, and it
received massive media coverage. But once again, there was no mention of the use
of cannabis by people with AIDS.
See


People With AIDS Benefit From – Not Harmed by Medical Marijuana in Government
Approved Test. Politically Very Important – Medically Pointless.
and links

Perhaps that was because
most of the media coverage focused on sub-Saharan Africa.

Reuters reported that “of
the estimated 42 million people worldwide infected with HIV, almost 30 million
live in sub-Saharan Africa, most far from the reach of medical treatments which
might prolong their lives…. U.N. officials the AIDS epidemic is a major cause of
Africa’s current food crisis. It is a sign, they say, of how basic building
blocks of society can crumble in the face of the disease.”

And medical cannabis is only an issue
in advanced countries. However, as I first pointed out in 1999, there is an even
greater need for medical cannabis in poor countries than in more prosperous
areas.

See


AIDS and Medical Marijuana:
On World AIDS Day Why Is No One Talking About the Cheapest Way To Help The Most
People? Analysis By Richard Cowan
and links

In Marihuana, the Forbidden
Medicine, Dr. Grinspoon argues that, because of the limitations of modern
medical institutions, cannabis can realize its full therapeutic potential only
when it is completely legal and people don’t have to go to their doctors to get
it. Of course, I think that organized quackery cannot be trusted with control
over access to the plant.
See


Live Free or Die – In Pain. The Ignorance and Arrogance of the Quacks Who Deny
Pain Relief to the Sick and Dying.
and links

However, the problem in poor countries is
simply that most people don’t have access to doctors in the first place and
home-grown remedies are all that they can afford. As a consequence, the whole
concept of a separate legal category for the medical use of cannabis is
impossible. In fact, only when cannabis is so cheap that it won’t be stolen,
would it be possible for poor people even to grow their own.

Ironically, one of the
stories on World AIDS Day posted today came from


OneWorld Africa reporting:

“Health professionals in Zambia are warning people with Human
Immunodeficiency Virus (HIV) against seeking treatment from traditional doctors
who offer low-cost “AIDS cures” that can have serious side effects.

The Network of
Zambian People Living with HIV (NZP+) said traditional doctors are making a
profit out of claims that herbal remedies they administer, with a few mystic
words, at makeshift clinics around the country eradicates the virus which can
lead to AIDS.

“Most of these
doctors don’t even have kits for testing HIV and yet they claim to have found a
cure,” said NZP+ spokesman Bwalya Mutale, noting the proliferating number of
newspaper adverts selling “miracle cures” for HIV, which is estimated to have
infected one fifth of Zambia’s 10.3 million population.

“Some of these
herbs are toxic and dangerous for human consumption,” said Francis Kasolo, a
virologist who is actively involved in HIV/AIDS research at Lusaka’s University
Teaching Hospital. The herbal treatments can exacerbate an HIV patient’s
condition, causing vomiting, dry coughs, and a bowel problems, according to
Kasolo, who added that some of his hospital colleagues had been asked to treat
such complications.

While there are no
figures on the number of people with HIV who take the herbs, the majority who
opt for such treatment do so because it is much cheaper, at about five cents for
a monthly supply, than standard anti-retroviral drugs, which cost about US$200
per month. Most Zambians earn less than US$50 per month….

Of the 40 million people
living with HIV around the world, less than two percent have access to medical
treatment, and most of them live in industrialized countries, the Joint United
Nations Programme on HIV/AIDS has reported.

Of course, there is no mention of
cannabis here, but it is quite clear that the people are desperate for any
relief. The specious prohibitionist argument that there are pharmaceutical
substitutes for cannabis are irrelevant in this context.

While cannabis cannot cure AIDS, many
long-term survivors in the West, some of whom have used nothing else, report
that it has made an enormous difference in the quality of their lives and there
is no reason to think that it would not be helpful in relieving the suffering
people who have nothing else. Anti-nausea/appetite stimulating drugs are among
the most expensive pharmaceuticals, and for years AIDS in Africa was know as the
“Slim-Disease” because of the wasting syndrome.

Anti-prohibitionists often point out
that much of the burden of the Drug War in developed countries is borne by the
poorest people in poor countries. But in the case of the medical use of
cannabis, the costs are pushed down to the sick and dying, as is the case in
most Western countries as well. Not only must they deal with the corruption and
violence caused by prohibition, they are deprived of even the possibility of
having access to cannabis, because a medical exemption is impossible for them.
See


Cameroon, One of the Poorest Countries in the World, Wants to Import Medical
Marijuana from Canada, One of the Richest Counties in the World. Why?

It should be noted that this problem
is hardly exclusive to people with AIDS. People in poor countries also lack
access to even the most basic pain relievers, and victims of accidents and
perennial civil wars have nothing to alleviate chronic pain.

Of course, DEAland has promoted its
war on cannabis to very receptive audiences in the police apparatuses of the
developing world. As in DEAland, it is an irresistible opportunity to increase
both their power and the opportunities for graft.
See


The UN Commission on Narcotic Drugs Resolution on the Control of Cannabis in
Africa. UN Narks Urge War on Poorest of the Poor. Cannabis Prohibition Does Most
Damage In Poor Countries.

Now here is the real problem.

Although it would still be
ideologically intolerable to the reefer madness crowd, legalizing cannabis in
sub-Saharan Africa would have no direct impact on DEAland. However, among the
countries that would benefit most from the medical use of cannabis is Mexico.
Other than “narcotics,” most drugs are sold over-the-counter at Mexican
pharmacies, because much of the population still cannot afford to go to a doctor
to get a prescription. In the interior, much of the population still lacks easy
access to modern medicine.

Already a number of Mexican leaders
have spoken of legalizing cannabis.
See


Mexican Governors’ Proposal for “Legalization” Becomes “Decriminalization” In
The New York Times. Meanwhile Canadian Senate Committee Says Something That
Sounds Like “Legalization” But Is Ignored.

It would be quite pointless for them to contemplate a
separate system for medical access or even to allow patients to grow their own
unless it is fully legalized and the cost is brought down so low that no one
would steal their medicine.

Obviously, full legalization in
Mexico would have a major impact on DEAland. So people with AIDS in Africa and
elsewhere amongst the poorest of the poor will simply have to suffer and die. It
is quite clear that the professional AIDS advocates will not speak up for them
for fear of losing their funding from the rich countries.

I have said that the suppression of
medical cannabis is mass murder, but in the real world it is simply cannabis
prohibition itself that assures that tens of millions of people will die sooner
and with far greater suffering than would be the case if they had easy access to
this plant.

Even Saddam Hussein has not caused so
much pain and suffering. Cannabis prohibition is indeed a weapon of mass
destruction that no government wants to acknowledge.

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