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Bill Would OK Medical Marijuana
01.13.07|SC Now|By Jim Newman

A new bill proposed this week by a South Carolina senator would legalize the use of marijuana for medical applications.

Sen. William Mescher, R-Pinopolis, introduced the legislation Tuesday, which has since been referred to the Senate’s Committee on Medical Affairs.

Mescher said his reasoning behind the controversial concept stems from the death of his first wife about 24 years ago from lung cancer.

He said he recalled doctors at the time telling him some of her symptoms could have been eased with the use of medical marijuana, which has the effect of easing the nausea associated with cancer treatments such as chemotherapy.

“There were concerns that she would become addicted,” he said. “Here this woman had maybe two or three months to live — and in extreme pain. It didn’t make any difference if she became addicted.”

Mescher said he felt further compelled to introduce the bill upon hearing recently from a friend who’s facing a similar dilemma.

“It took me 10 years to get tattooing regulated in South Carolina,” Mescher said. “I’ve got a bulldog tenacity.”

But Dr. Rajesh Bajaj, an oncologist with Carolina Health Care in Florence, said he doubts the overall effectiveness of marijuana in treating cancer-related nausea.

“In my opinion, it’s the rare patient who would be needing marijuana for nausea,” he said. “I don’t think many physicians would prescribe it because of the variety of medications that are available to treat nausea in patients with cancer.”

Bajaj said that one of those medications in particular, called Marinol, contains the active ingredient found in marijuana and comes in tablet form. Using marijuana in its pure form, however, is not recommended, he said.

“Society has to weigh whether it wants to legalize a substance for the benefit of the rare patient or control it for everybody else,” he said.

Mescher said he feels some patients could benefit from the alternative despite this outlook.

“To me, it’s no different than morphine or any other painkiller that a doctor can prescribe,” he said. “Some doctors say it doesn’t help. But if the person thinks it’s helping them, then it’s helping them.”

This isn’t Mescher’s first time at bat while defending a hot issue at the Statehouse in Columbia. For about a decade, he pushed for legalizing tattooing in South Carolina so it could be regulated in the interest of protecting public health.

He said he expects this new measure will become a highly contested matter, as well, but he plans to move forward with it just as he did with the controversial tattoo bill.