So, why would the American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP) want to decriminalize marijuana?
Here’s why:
- Because marijuana is illegal, many youths, especially minority youths, become caught up in the criminal justice system, which can affect their job prospects, educational prospects, housing, financial, aid and other such things for a lifetime. Youths should be provided with drug treatment services if they are marijuana users, not made into criminals.
- Pharmaceutical drugs approved by the FDA, such as cannabinoids and cannabidiol, have been proven through research to be helpful in adults with certain conditions such as cancer to decrease nausea and vomiting and to lesson pain in adult patients with chronic pain syndromes. There is no published research on marijuana for medical purposes in adolescents. Marijuana should be changed from a Schedule I (no currently accepted medical use and a high potential for abuse/dependency) to a Schedule II drug (less abuse potential than Schedule I drugs and available for research) so that research on its medical affects in adolescents can be conducted to determine if it may help adolescents with serious illnesses, as it does in adults with certain illnesses.
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