Ron Paul said, ” The war against marijuana causes so much hardship and accomplishes nothing.”
A 2008 study by Harvard economist Jeffrey A. Miron has estimated that legalizing drugs would inject $76.8 billion a year into the U.S. economy–a number combining an estimated savings in money spent on law enforcement and money that would be earned from tax revenue.
California’s medical marijuana industry generated $100 million in state sales taxes in 2008.
Opponents consider it a gateway drug for heavier drug use. Mitt Romney said, “But marijuana is the entry drug for people trying to get kids hooked on drugs. I don’t want medicinal marijuana. There are synthetic forms of marijuana that are available for people who need it for prescription. Don’t open the doorway to medicinal marijuana.”
Although medicinal marijuana is legal in many states, it is still illegal on a Federal Level.
WOHM had a chance to sit down with Ray of Homegrown Natural Wonders–a medicinal marjiuna grower based in Oregon–to chat about the medicinal marijuana industry.
Homegrown Natural Wonders won three awards at the 2011 Oregon Medical Cannabis Awards.
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Is Homegrown Natural Wonder’s your employment?
No, we’re trying to get this Homegrown Natural Wonder’s off the ground with some calendars and things like that, but we can’t make money off our actual product.
It’s legal for us to grow it for us and for the patient. As far as dispersing it, we are not allowed to make a profit from it. We can ask for reimbursement from our patients for our electricity and our soils and things to that effect, but other than that we can’t charge. A lot of this we just do because we love it.
How did you get into growing medical marijuana?
I have some patients who are really bad health wise. I have one gentleman who has had a migraine since ’07. He lived with a pain level from 7-9 before he met us, and he tried just about every pharmaceutical that they could give him.
I have our patients fill out forms that tell us exactly what (they are) taking, so we can keep track of what works for them best. This gentleman with the migraines, now is down to a two and a zero, after using medicinal marijuana, tinctures and cannabis oil–which is all stuff we make an provide for our patients.
So now he is able to enjoy life and enjoy his children. His quality of life has just improved immensely.
So you guys don’t really actively pursue new clients? You just deal with the patients you already have?
Yeah, pretty much. You are allowed four patience per grower and you can do multiple growers per site. At this point I’m only taking on certain people who have really bad issues. We just recently signed a lady, who according to her charts, has fibromyalgia.
We unfortunately just had a couple of patients who passed away–so that opened up room for a couple of new patients. But we are really selective with who we accept because I really want to see what we can do for people. I want to make sure they have a real condition. I truly think there is quite a bit of medicinal value (with medicinal marijuana) and this is really the only way we can find out.
Do you guys have a wait list?
Yeah, I guess you could call it that. We definitely have a lot of people who would love for us to be their growers, but we can’t really have dispensaries here. So we are really limited as far as that goes in this state. We tried for dispensaries with the last ballet measure and it didn’t pass. I think a lot of that had to do with patients thinking they would have to start purchasing their medicine–even though it didn’t say that anywhere within the literature.
Is the Federal Government still as involved in the medical marijuana issue as they were in the past? I feel like it isn’t as big of an issue in the news as it used to be.
Yeah, the disputes still go on. The Feds are actually doing a bunch right now in California. Their raiding a bunch of people.
The pharmaceutical companies just came out and got Sativex approved–that is a synthetic canibanoid found in medicinal marijuana. I don’t understand why they think synthetic is so much better.
So there still is a lot of Federal push. Unfortunately it’s still a big mess.
It seems like a pretty unfair fight. You guys aren’t even making any money off your product.
That’s why it’s an uphill battle. We’re fighting pharmaceutical companies. Dow Chemicals has way more money than anybody in the pharmaceutical marijuana industry. They have the money to buy the politicians. They have the money to do that.
It’s obviously been said in several states that this is what the people want, but still the Feds continue to push and say, ‘You can’t do this and you can’t do that.’
It’s definitely got a long way to go. Barney Frank and Ron Paul have some good bills they are trying to make work.
You can visit and support Home Grown Natural Wonders at http://www.homegrownnaturalwonders.com/