Arizona edged closer to 15,000 medical marijuana patients in October, when the state Department of Health Services reported that 14,852 patients have been approved for MMJ cards and just seven denied.
Thirty-five souls were in limbo while their applications were “in-review,” according to the state report released Oct. 27.
The eastward trend among patients continues in metro Tucson, where 1,508 people had applied for MMJ cards. The two statistical areas stretching from the far East Side to the county line still show the most MMJ applications in the city – a combined 488. The report does not give populations for the Community Health Analysis Areas. The state had received 778 applications from potential caregivers, approving 745 with 30 more awaiting fingerprints. Of the 15,000ish people who asked to smoke pot for relief, about 83 percent – 12,367 – asked to grow.
So, more than 12,000 people in Arizona are presumably knee deep in pot plants and a few thousand more are smoking it up daily for various ailments (86 percent for chronic pain). Has there been an outbreak of freakish crime in your neighborhood perpetrated by crazed pot fiends? Wild-eyed, naked hash-eaters running down the street? Hallucinating child molesters flashing your kids or getting them hooked on dope?
Didn’t think so.
This article appears in Nov 17-23, 2011.
This is a good thing. That’s 15,000 people NOT buying illegal weed off drug dealers on the street!
Ditch the “medical” label and we could have every adult in the state buying legally-grown marijuana from legally-operated stores. This would have a devastating impact on drug dealers, slashing their profit margins, driving them off the street and making our children far safer.
I totally agree with jway! Legitimate markets kill the incentive for black markets to smuggle drugs. Legitimize the business and we can stop funding the criminal element and terrorism.
Prohibition is a waste of police resources in my opinion. Growing, possessing, and using marijuana is a civil liberty in a free society. People should not have to justify their civil liberties to the government. Regardless of how you feel about local law enforcement cracking down on marijuana. I hope we can all agree that it should be a state level decision and not a federal prohibition. Here’s how we can end the federal prohibition and restore power to the states. The proposed legislation is called H.R. 2306 and everyone should support the federal government getting out of state business.
Tell your representatives -> http://pvox.co/CdiFqY
“[Prohibition] attempts to control a man’s appetite by legislation, and makes a crime out of things that are not crimes.” – Abraham Lincoln
Brilliant idea! We don’t spend enough time pointing out the failure of their dire predictions to come true. It should be pointed out again and again and rubbed in their faces until they can’t deny it any longer.