The World featured my recent post reacting to medical marijuana being recommended by some doctors as a “treatment” for ADHD in an article focusing on marijuana used medicinally on children. That’s always cool. But I mention it primarily because the article reports that some parents are apparently giving it to their autistic kids in hope that it will help. From the story:
The battle over medical marijuana has shifted to a new front with reports that California clinics have been prescribing pot to patients as young as 14 to treat ADHD symptoms, while parents are feeding kids as young as 9 pot-infused cookies as a last resort to help them cope with autism. Proponents of cannabis for kids say it can also help treat cancer and AIDS symptoms. Opponents? “How many ways can one say ‘one of the worst ideas of all time?’” asks UC Berkeley psychologist Stephen Hinshaw. Is there ever a valid reason to prescribe pot for kids? (Watch one family’s success treating autism with marijuana)
This is getting out of hand. It is long past time for the Feds to change the drug’s classification in the Controlled Substances Act and permit testing to see which conditions cannabis can—and just as importantly, which it can’t—treat, and then permit or deny it accordingly.
