Officials in Illinois are considering expanding access to medical marijuana for people using opioid painkillers, arguing it can help reduce addiction rates.
Democratic state Sen. Don Harmon is proposing a bill that would offer marijuana to any patient taking opioids as an alternative treatment. Supporters argue cannabis can serve as a safe and effective way to treat chronic pain without opioids, drastically reducing the risk for addiction and death from an overdose, reports NPR Illinois.
The bill allows any doctor to prescribe marijuana to someone taking opioids, something they are currently barred from doing. There are currently 40 qualifying conditions for medical marijuana in the state, including cancer and AIDS, that serves roughly 27,000 patients. Under the proposed legislation a significantly larger portion of the population will now qualify for medical marijuana.
“We’re trying to make sure that any condition where an opioid could be prescribed, the doctor can certify that and the patient can plan ahead so that they have an alternative,” Harmon told NPR Illinois. “What we really want to do is make sure that people aren’t using opioids for a month, two months or three months and reach this point where they are addicted to it and end up going backwards.”
The bill also waves the current requirement forcing medical marijuana patients to undergo fingerprinting and criminal background checks, and accelerates patient approval from the current three-month wait to only 14-days.
Dr. Charles Bush-Joseph, a renowned surgeon in Chicago, recently came out in favor of the proposal and is urging his colleagues to do the same. Bush-Joseph said he sees the devastation opioid treatment can wreak on patients after a surgery all too often, that opened him up to medical marijuana as an alternative treatment.
A study published April 1 in the journal Drug and Alcohol Dependence found in states with legal weed hospital visits for complications from prescription painkillers are dropping. The hospitalization rate for opioid abuse and dependence in states with medical marijuana are roughly 23 percent lower than states without legal access.
Emergency room visits for opioid overdoses are on average 13 percent lower than states without medical marijuana programs.
Medical researchers do not claim pot will “solve” the opioid epidemic, but the study adds to a growing body of evidence that marijuana can be an effective alternative to the painkillers that often lead to heroin abuse and death.
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