“Medical” marijuana: More states legalizing, but scientific evidence lacking

Dr. Margaret Haney is the director of the Marijuana Research Laboratory at Columbia University in New York. Her lab is one of a handful that receives government funding for studies on marijuana, including research on potential therapeutic uses of the drug. These studies are crucial, Haney points out, because carefully controlled studies on marijuana’s effects are lacking. When a new drug gets approved by the Food and Drug Administration, researchers have to demonstrate in series of studies that the drug outperforms a placebo pill to cause a therapeutic effect. This is not the case for marijuana in its plant form.
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