American Legion throws weight behind marijuana research

The American Legion has called on Congress to remove marijuana from the list of drugs that are classified as having no potential medical use.

The Legion, the country’s largest veterans organization with 2.4 million members, passed a resolution at its annual convention last week to promote research on marijuana’s potential use for treating post-traumatic stress disorder and traumatic brain injury.

The resolution noted that with thousands of veterans from Iraq and Afghanistan diagnosed with PTSD or TBI, and the Drug Enforcement Agency’s recent approval of a study on the effectiveness of cannabis for PTSD, Congress should remove marijuana from its Schedule I designation, where it shares space with heroin, Ecstasy, LSD, Quaaludes and peyote.

“Amend legislation to remove marijuana from Schedule I and reclassify it in a category that, at a minimum, will recognize cannabis as a drug with potential medical value,” the Legion wrote in its resolution, first reported by marijuana.com.

The Drug Enforcement Agency in April approved the first randomized, controlled research in the U.S. that will use inhaled marijuana to treat PTSD.

Read more at Military Times

Image courtesy of npr.org