Harrisburg politicians need to get the out of our medical treatment
The impertinence of Pennsylvanian Republicans injecting excessive and biased regulations on medical patients in our Commonwealth is lamentable by any measure. They are not doctors despite their deep desire to regulate how medical marijuana patients treat their disabilities and health needs. They forced a socialist system where there’s a large payout to the state at every level, from grower to patient, and Venezuelan style shortages of the most common forms of medicine leading to continue profits for the black market. It’s more than a bit insulting, it’s downright disgusting.
Marijuana can not kill you, but oxycontin can. Our state and country is in the throes of the most devastating and pervasive drug epidemic in our history because of an addiction problem that started with drugs obtained at a pharmacy. There is no special state issued identification card required to get opioids despite their exceedingly lethal nature, even now just a standard doctors prescription is all that is necessary. For Medical Marijuana patients though, using an entirely non-lethal product, the State has put much different, intrusive and cost-prohibitive measures in place.
For instance the Medical Marijuana card cost $250 dollars out of pocket. $200 for an extra visit to a doctor who you see one time and are not treated by on a regular basis. They simply review what your specialist or PCP has already confirmed and has been treating for years. These guys now get to exploit your medical condition for huge monetary gain. That might not sound like a lot but keep in mind that a couple hundred dollars is a lot of money for people on fixed incomes, let alone the fact this is the only medicine where doctors are allowed to extort you for the prescription.
Then there is $50 to the state. Which might not seem like a big deal until you consider that it’s basically a driver’s license card, which only cost $35.50 by the way. Driver’s license need obtained a mere once every four years versus the yearly renewal required for medical marijuana cards. Which also brings anywhere between another $100 to $200 in annual fees with it depending on what the doctor renewing your card decides to charge.
Why is the state targeting patients for monetary exploitation based on the medicine received? A lot of these patients are elderly or are on fixed incomes, these extra yearly cost, not to mention extra out of pocket visits to a doctor other than your own, are very demeaning to medical marijuana patients. The state does not respect us and we are treated as a different class of citizens, ones that can be exploited at every level, because of antiquated views on the most effective medicines for our conditions.
Why must we be subjected to shortages, faulty state run computer systems, excessive fees, limited growers and processors, sparsely located dispensaries, and over-the-top bureaucratic intrusions into our medical treatment because Republicans refuse to accept modern medical findings?聽
These two words can sum up the Republicans attitudes toward Pennsylvania’s medical marijuana patients; resentment and disregard. Some of them would have us all arrested.
Jesse Blackburn is a resident of Uniontown