Suffering patients denied medical pot




Regarding the April 22 article, “Westlake Village Bans Medical Pot Dispensaries,” cancer is hell. Chemotherapy is its waiting room.

In an evil twist, not only does chemotherapy induce nausea, vomiting and explosive diarrhea, but antiemetics—drugs meant to stem these—often exacerbate them.

Chemotherapy’s side effects can sometimes be controlled with medical marijuana.

We were lucky. Our family didn’t have to brave marginal neighborhoods, breaking laws to ease mom’s suffering, nor worry about the cleanliness or additives to the medicine, as it was safely, professionally and legally dispensed.

THC absorbs quickest through marijuana smoke, though at 84 pounds, perhaps she’d tolerate marijuana-laced Twinkies, chocolates, Rice Krispies or brownies and gain weight.

Westlake’s ban on medical marijuana dispensaries is morally reprehensible, a mistake the extent of which cannot be verbalized. The suffering of people needing this alternative is profound. No one who voted for the ban could ever have witnessed firsthand, the devastation of cancer and chemo, nor cried with relief witnessing its benefit to their loved ones.

Do they fear unsavory, drug seeking crowds invading the streets? Surely, those needing this drug are too busy just surviving. Though privilege is certainly no indication of spiritual or moral integrity, many arrive at dispensaries in luxury autos as often as economy cars, just as they do the pharmacies/ supermarkets where stronger more costly drugs are sold. No rash of robberies has befallen those establishments.

Imagine if all pain medication were banned because Westlake felt they could be “better dispensed!” Pandemonium—nothing for arthritis, back pain, headache, your child’s sore throat, menstrual cramps.

Wherever there is opportunity, criminal minds try to destroy. People rob banks, yet banks remain. Embezzlers steal, people defraud in real estate scams, yet businesses thrive and real estate transactions close.

Criminals are equal opportunity employers—like cancer.

I don’t have a dog in this fight anymore, but my heart knows what’s right. Mom’s gone now. Pop followed eight days later.

Cancer. Melanie Smith Brunell Calabasas



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