Out of 3,882 patients who had heart attacks, 124 were current cannabis smokers and nine had smoked within an hour of their heart attack. Based on this minuscule, self-selected sample, Dr. Mittleman concludes that the risk of a heart attack is 4.8 times higher after smoking cannabis.

Assuming the Dr. Mittleman's conclusions are accurate, the fact that heart attack risk for an otherwise healthy 50-year-old man is about 10 in 1 million highlights the sensationalism of the widespread publicity the study is receiving. Such junk science is routinely funded by the United States government and well-publicized.

Millions have been spent trying to find harm in a relatively harmless plant. Regardless of whether or not the study in question is ever replicated and subjected to peer review, the results will no doubt be repeated by drug warriors for decades.

The goal of a "drug-free" America that so many politicians claim to be working toward applies only to certain drugs. Specifically, natural
drugs that cannot be patented by the pharmaceutical industry, one of Washington's most powerful lobbies and a primary funder of the
Partnership for a Drug-Free America. New lifestyle drugs are routinely granted fast-track government approval by the Food and Drug
Administration, while marijuana, which has been used medicinally for thousands of years, allegedly requires further research.

Despite a relatively brief period on the market, the blatantly recreational drug Viagra has already killed more people than marijuana, a relatively harmless drug compared to toxic alcohol and highly addictive tobacco.
Nationwide, cancer and AIDS patients are being locked up at taxpayers' expense for using medical marijuana, while 2-year-olds are prescribed Ritalin.

So much for protecting the children from drugs. One need only follow the money trail to find out why a given policy exists.

Robert Sharpe, M.P.A.
Program Officer, The Lindesmith Center-Drug Policy Foundation
Washington, D.C.