For the mother of a little girl with a severe form of epilepsy, medical marijuana treatment is a simple matter of life and death.
“I don’t care about their opinions or their politics; I’m trying to save my child’s life,” said military spouse Felicia Harris regarding opponents of medical marijuana in Tennessee.
However, for the politicians debating a medical marijuana bill (HB 1385, the Koozer-Kuhn Medical Cannabis Act) currently in committee in the Tennessee House, politics and the opinions of constituents are also a stark reality, as is opposition from the Tennessee Medical Association and law enforcement officials.
And while opposition among physicians to medical marijuana is largely informed by long-standing protocols involving the cautious development and approval of medical treatments, much of the public opposition comes from deep-seated images developed through nearly a century of anti-drug messages, associations with criminality and an all-out war on recreational use.
