If tobacco and alcohol are legal, then illicit drugs should be legal too. "Relative to alcohol and tobacco, marijuana is a far safer drug of choice" (Scriven, 191). Drunk driving and lung cancer are one of the number one killers. This makes illicit drugs not as harmful.
Doctors need drugs sometimes for medical use. "Two prime uses of marijuana are for the treatment of glaucoma and as an adjunct to cancer chemotherapy. Marijuana relieves the constant nausea and vomiting that are an unfortunate and inevitable side effect of cancer medication" (Scriven, 192). "Heroin has proven highly effective in helping patients to deal with severe pain; some researchers have found it more effective than morphine and other opiates in treating pain in some patients" (Inciardi/McElrath, 294). "The psychedelic drugs, such as LSD, peyote, and ecstasy have shown promise in aiding psychotherapy and in reducing tension, depression, pain, and fear of death in the terminally ill; they also have demonstrated some potential, as yet unconfirmed, to aid in the treatment of alcoholism" (Inciardi/McElrath, 294). From these facts, it is clearly proven that doctors use illicit drugs on many patients. It makes patients relaxed and free of pain. "Indeed, in a recent informal poll, some 48 percent of cancer specialists reported they would prescribe marijuana in such cases were it legal to do so" (Scriven, 192). The use of illegal drugs should be permitted for medical purposes even if they never get legalized.
Gustavo de Grieff, Attorney General of Columbia, "stressed the importance of legalization of the business, transport and sale of drugs so that the business stops being so monstrously obscene, and to convert it into an ordinary business that additionally will produce taxes that can be invested in the good of society" (Pascual, 2). De Grieff also said, the billions of dollars that are spent annually to repress drug trafficking that will then be able to be dedicated to other goals" (Pascual, 2).
