You’re five. Your life has been filled with nothing but hospital stays, ambulance rides, helicopter rides, neurologists, genetic counseling, EEG’s, medications, ketogenic diet, dietitians, nurses, speech therapy, first response teams, pharmacists, good days, bad days, coping, not coping, tears of sadness, blame, research and the list goes on. You have Dravet syndrome. You’re now 10 and your seizures have reduced from more than 70 long seizures a day, to one or even zero lasting only seconds. What has magically changed your life over the last five years? Medical cannabis oil. More commonly known as marijuana. This is the life of my cousin. A little boy named Liam McKnight, whose parents have fought for his right to his medication for years now. I am convinced that medical marijuana must become readily available for people like Liam. My arguments to advocate for this are it saves lives, it’s safer than other medications, and it makes having a normal life a possibility. Medical marijuana (or cannabis) saves lives. Disorders such as Dravet syndrome have no cure and limited resources to treat them. People like Liam have nothing else that even comes close to help them. Alzheimer 's, Arthritis, Crohn 's disease, MS, Dravet and other incurable illnesses are …show more content…
That’s how many people died in the first six months of 2017 from prescription drug overdoses. Do you want to know how many people have died due to a cannabis overdose? Zero. You would have to ingest an impossible amount for it to be lethal. To add to this, it’s easy to become addicted to prescription medication. While it’s easy to become addicted to recreational marijuana, it’s harder to become addicted to medical marijuana, depending on the THC content. In the United States, there is a significant reduction in painkiller and prescription drug overdoses in states that allow cannabis oil and medical marijuana. I am convinced that if Canada legalizes and regulates medical marijuana, it will be safer for