Whoopi Goldberg has lent her support to a bill in her state of New York that would expand medical marijuana there to cover the treatment of menstrual cramps, among other conditions not currently covered. Medical marijuana is legal in the state for just some serious conditions like cancer, Parkinson’s and MS, but this bill would expand it to include the treatment of chronic pain including menstrual pain. The NY Daily News has this, with the detail that Goldberg included a personal statement in a letter to Governor Cuomo asking him to support this bill.
The actress and co-host of “The View” issued a statement Tuesday urging legislators and Gov. Cuomo to get behind a bill sponsored by Assemblywoman Linda Rosenthal (D-Manhattan) that would expand New York’s tightly controlled medical pot program to cover dysmenorrhea, or menstrual cramps.
“Women have used cannabis for menstrual pain for as long as time, and this pain is real for a lot of us,” Goldberg said in the statement.
“I’m glad to see states like New York starting to get serious about this and when it gets to Gov. Cuomo’s desk we hope he recognizes and champions this conversation, and allows these decisions to be made between patients and their doctor by signing this very important bill Assemblywoman Rosenthal sponsored,” Goldberg continued…
Currently, state law allows medical marijuana to be used to for only a handful of serious illnesses and conditions, including cancer, HIV and AIDS, Lou Gehrig’s, Parkinson’s and Huntington’s diseases, epilepsy, some spinal cord injuries and multiple sclerosis. In December, the state added chronic pain to the list of conditions that can be treated with medical marijuana.
A bill that would allow medical marijuana to be used for post-traumatic stress disorder was approved by the Assembly earlier this month but is still awaiting a vote in the Senate.
[From NY Daily News]
As someone who suffers from severe menstrual cramps and has lived in non medical marijuana states, where the penalties for smokers are high, it has never occurred to me that pot could help. I currently spent 1-2 days a cycle in bed, although my doctor recently put me on birth control to try to mitigate that. (It’s working somewhat, but there are other issues/side effects associated with that, the details of which I’ll spare you.) So many people are addicted to opiates and pain medication and the statistics show that opiate overdoses dramatically decrease in the states where medical marijuana is available. I hope this bill passes and that medical marijuana is expanded in NY. I would like to see it become available across the whole US, but we’ve suffered so many setbacks recently that I know it’s not likely anytime soon.
photos credit: WENN.com
Source: celebitchy.com
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