Marijuana Argumentative Analysis

The debate over legalization marijuana and the medical use of marijuana has been the most argumentative issue throughout the history of United States. There are tons of questions that need the final answers for this controversial topic, but the most debatable one is: Should marijuana be legalized and taxed? Everything has its pros and cons. The government has the ability to find the benefits of legalizing marijuana such as: reducing the pain the medical purposes, preventing consumers from using marijuana illegally, and somehow developing the United States’ economic. Otherwise, broadly using marijuana is extremely dangerous. Marijuana should be a controlled substance for medical uses in limited departments and it should be taxed with higher
What is exactly marijuana? According to the National Institute on Drug Abuse (2014), marijuana, which also called weed, is a dry, shredded green and brown mix of leaves, flowers, stems, and seeds form the hemp plant Cannabis sativa. In addition, the main chemical in marijuana is produced by leaves and buds primarily of the female cannabis plant, the plant is also contains more than 500 other chemicals, including over 100 compounds that are chemically related to cannabinoidsa (“Marijuana,” 2014). Marijuana has been used for medical purposes for a long period of time. This is one of the main reasons that many people think marijuana should be legalized. The idea is not entirely wrong. The article by Watisla and Palumbo (2013) supports that doctors sometimes prescribe medical marijuana to treat: muscle spasms caused by multiple sclerosis, nausea form cancer chemotherapy, poor appetite and weight loss caused by chronic illness, such as HIV, or nerve pain. Moreover, marijuana is able to make people
While tobacco has a bad reputation for pumping the giant amount of nicotine in to lungs, marijuana is estimated to have 50% to 70% more cancer-causing substances than tobacco smoke (“Marijuana”, n.d). The effect is extremely amplified by the fact that many marijuana smokers inhale deeply than cigarette smokers. The main reason is they think that marijuana is just like the herbal plants, it does not harm after all. They do not know that smoking marijuana can increase the amount of time the lungs are working and exposes to cancer-causing chemicals. In addition, heart health is also affected by smoking marijuana. It increases the risk of several problems including heart palpitations, arrthythmias, and heart-attack. Smoking marijuana’s effects on the heart can make smoking marijuana a high-risk activity for not only seniors but also people suffering heart-disease conditions. According to the articles called “Medical Marijuana Legislation: What We Know and Don’t”, the authors mention specific statistic about people who abused the medical uses of marijuana. In 2010, 12.2 million United States citizens aged twelve and older reported past-year non-medical use of prescription OAS, a ten percent increase from 2002, making OAs the most abused drugs after marijuana, consequences of OAs abuse include