By Nicole Flatow | Think Progress
More than 40 years ago, psychiatry professor Lester Grinspoon wrote a groundbreaking book on marijuana that The New York Times dubbed at the time “the best dope on pot.” Like many in the medical marijuana community, Grinspoon started out as a skeptic intent on researching marijuana’s harms. But his perspective shifted after a personal experience: He had a son with leukemia who found relief only after he started using marijuana before his chemotherapy treatments. Once he started researching marijuana, Grinspoon found that existing information about marijuana was based on propaganda rather than rigorous scientific study.
“I came to realize that I was the one who was misinformed — that despite my training in science and medicine, I had been brainwashed like just about every other citizen of this country,” Grinspoon said in a 2001 interview. For continuing his research on medical marijuana, Grinspoon was in the intervening decades denied promotions and isolated from his Harvard Medical School colleagues until he took emeritus status, he said.
If you’d like to discuss marijuana issues, contact Ryan Hurley, director of the Rose Law Group Medical Marijuana Dept. rhurley@roselawgroup.com
