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Comment by firefax | Hacker News Reader

More evidence cannabis needs to be recreational. We can let people use their FSA money for it and/or give a steep discount to people who "really" need it, like cancer patients... but I think a lot of people who bounce between

Anyways, there are a LOT of little fly by night outfits that "help" you get a medical card in many states. It's a joke, and all it does is empower the same type of person who used to be a pill doctor to rent seek, and it's not at all a surprise one had poor data practices.

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This seems totally unrelated to whether cannabis should be recreational. If my insurance company leaked my PHI, that would certainly not be evidence that any of my prescriptions should be OTC.

>This seems totally unrelated to whether cannabis should be recreational.

Basically, they only pretend it's "medical" in order to gatekeep and rentseek care. Since they are interested in profit rather than actual services, their systems tend to have many issues.

I mean... if you ask me prescriptions for things like cholesterol or blood pressure should be OTC, benefit outweighs the risk. Nobody is getting high off statins. Imagine how much that would save our healthcare system. Insulin is the one dubious thing because it can be very deadly if misused... and it IS in fact OTC because it can be deadly if unavailable, benefit outweighs the risk.

Insulin is very much not "the one" dubious thing. There are very many things which are prescribed these have abuse potential and which could be deadly if misused.

> Nobody is getting high off statins.

I mean, fun story time; back in 2014 my dad's house was broken into, and among other things they stole was a bottle of a benzo, and while most of my dad's medications were untouched they stole his blood pressure meds.

As I was opining this to a colleague, another employee that was within earshot explained that no, for certain things it can 'enhance' the high... go figure.

I am fairly knowledgeable about drug abuse but was not aware of that, maybe your coworker was slightly telling on themselves?

(Sadly mostly through dealing with others navigating it, in case anyone is jonesing for judgement.)

IMHO only reason cannabis is illegal is it's a threat to Pharma Industry, Pharma Lobby, aka organized, legal crime.

Despite some of the discourse there are some long term side-effects (though it seems mostly especially bad for adolescents where stopping consumption does not revert the impact on cognitive function): https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Long-term_effects_of_cannabi...

Then it's a societal choice between the benefits of easier access to it for medical use (non-OTC drugs are harder to get when you need them) plus lower burden on law enforcement when it does not have to deal with this anymore, and the opportunity cost to society when some people don't use it responsibly and waste their chances. I see positives and negatives for both choices.

(I don't believe other drugs being legal is an argument, alcohol and tobacco wouldn't be legal if discovered today but because they have widespread use it's impossible to forbid them)

Cannabis is widely used today. Half of US adults have smoked it at one point of their life. 20% regularly smoke it. We are at the point where more people use it than alcohol in the US.

>We are at the point where more people use it than alcohol in the US.

Citation needed on that one.

https://apnews.com/article/marijuana-cannabis-alcohol-drinki...

Thank you! Really didn't expect that. I feel like in my personal space the people that partake haven't changed much. Drinking has gone down but I assumed it's an ageing thing.

From the standpoint of "hard to ban what's used by a large part of the population" this does justify legalization indeed.

I don't have strong opinions on this, I was mostly a bit triggered by the parent's comment weird theory that "cannabis was only forbidden because of criminal big pharma". (I assumed "only reason" implied that they thought it was a safe drug without side-effects or risks; all (medical/non-medical) drugs have side-effects and risks so not being 100% safe isn't a reason for banning by itself, but that's a factor in the risk/benefit balance).

> From the standpoint of "hard to ban what's used by a large part of the population" this does justify legalization indeed.

I think they meant more that the negative effects don't seem that big because most people are ok even with such a large proportion of people already being experienced with it.

> triggered by the parent's comment weird theory that "cannabis was only forbidden because of criminal big pharma".

I don't believe it was either but I'm not sure your counter evidence really works. The science that you alluded to about long term effects all significantly post-dates the ban so couldn't have played a role in it.

I could get behind this so long as there’s still limits on your person and in public places. Colorado has a great system. However, legalization has only created weed monopolies by abuse of the law language. Essentially making it illegal for smaller shops to compete.

Those same people are the ones contracting out these systems with local governments.

The limits don’t really make sense either. Plenty of people grow for personal use and all of them will be in violation considering the yield from a single outdoor plant could be well over a pound dry.

If you grow for personal use, why are you transporting it? I’m fine with storing as much as you like as home. If it’s legal across the US then this doesn’t really matter at all. I’m talking about limits on your person, for personal use, when not at home, in public. I don’t want to smell like a Rastafarian when I go to work.

To smoke with others?

Do you need a kg to do that or is an ounce enough? I feel like an oz is enough to transport to your friends and get them all passed out. Which in some states the limit is 2 oz.

Why even limit it though? I can bring ten thousand cans of beer to my friends house I don’t see why this is any different. It is just designed to still have a mechanism to entrap people is why. If dealing without a commercial license is already illegal, then having some personal amount limit is redundant if that is supposedly the reason for it.

That's not even remotely true. Anything over 12 bottles requires permits. There's also open container laws, federal laws like you can't bring it to a state where sales are prohibited. State Troopers will cite you for anything over a gallon in some states.

I'm all for freedom, but there has to be some limits to protect the general public from complete marijuana anarchy.

ya, here in Canada(caniba), nobody much cared what someone smoked or why, as long as they did it down wind and out of sight since forever, and I have heard irrate little ones admonishing adults "your not supposed to do that around us!" and grown adults eye rolling and moving off....now there are certain parks for the weed heads, and various semi legal stores and some government weed outlets, but as it's not called weed for nothing, millions grow the little they want for personal use, and for people wanting it for medical reasons, there is a vast network of people helping people. We went through the whole "certified medical canabis" thing, and it collapsed under overwhelming demand, and the impossibility of scaling the management, where the police and courts flat out refused to try and untangle the "legitimate" and "unligitimate", and we are back to what it was in the past with an informal understanding of ....go down wind and out of sight of the kids,thank you

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