From a Kansan with chronic pain: It’s time for our state to embrace medical cannabis
A grower cultivates marijuana plants in Nevada in 2017. Kansas legislative have yet to allow a vote in either chamber for medical marijuana. (Ethan Miller/Getty Images)
Four years ago, I started feeling sluggish. I felt like I had a fever, even though my temperature never topped 100 degrees. The pain in your skin when you’re feverish, the ache you feel in your joints. I felt fatigued.
Assuming I had some kind of bug, I went to bed for a few days, felt better and returned to life as usual. But a few weeks later it happened again, and again, until this unexplained illness became almost routine. Three years ago, I mentioned these unusual symptoms to my doctor, who gave me my first of many referrals to a specialist.
Two years ago, these bouts of symptoms started to become debilitating. There would be weeks where I was too tired to think and felt too much pain to move. It felt like a terrible flu, but without explanation. I have a family history of thyroid disease, so I was sent to an endocrinologist. Doctors thought it might be my kidney function, so I was sent to urology. Maybe a blood disorder? Hematology.
On and on it went, until I was finally diagnosed with fibromyalgia earlier this year.
Fibromyalgia is a common condition, affecting anywhere from 2 to 8% of the population, and causes chronic pain and fatigue. There is no known cure, and it is difficult to treat. Despite what some legislators say, there is a rigorous process for getting diagnosed with a chronic pain condition such as fibromyalgia. For me, it took seeing more than a dozen specialists, and more than 80 medical tests — some of which were very invasive — over the span of three years before receiving a diagnosis. Treatment options are limited to lifestyle changes and prescription-only controlled substances that are not consistently effective. It may be difficult to find one, if any, that works for a patient.
Living with a chronic pain condition can be difficult.
Living with chronic pain in the state of Kansas is more difficult, because state law bans the use of medical cannabis. Fibromyalgia is hereditary, so I know from family members who live in other states that medical cannabis has been a godsend for them in treating the chronic pain and sleep disruptions that come with the condition — and studies show they aren’t alone.
Beyond fibromyalgia, it is estimated that 26% of Kansans have some sort of chronic pain condition and that nearly half of them take an opioid to treat that pain. That is about 765,000 Kansans living with chronic pain who have a proven effective and safer alternative treatment option being withheld from them — not by their doctors but by our legislators.
Year after year, our legislators come up with excuses for failing to take action on medical cannabis. Lawmakers sometimes oppose this policy with seemingly hysterical hypotheticals. They warn of the organized crime that comes with government-regulated marijuana, even though there is no evidence that legalization leads to an increase in crime. They say that it will lead to legalizing recreational use, even though the Legislature would have to pass a law for that to happen. They caution us of a new market for drug abuse, even though the opioid alternatives have caused unthinkable amounts of harm.
As U.S. Navy veteran and emergency medicine physician Bryon McNeil said during a hearing on a different medical cannabis bill earlier this year, “the fear surrounding cannabis is simply not rooted in reality. Give Kansans the medical freedom to choose cannabis over prescription drugs.”
A 2023 survey showed that 67% of Kansans, including a majority of Republicans, support the legalization of cannabis for recreational consumption. That policy is far less restrictive than the proposed legislation to legalize medicinal cannabis. It’s beyond belief that an overwhelming majority of Kansans can agree on any policy across the political divide, but what’s more shocking is that legislative leadership and their appointed committee chairs have kept medical marijuana bills from receiving a vote in either chamber.
That may change when lawmakers return to the Statehouse this week. When the Legislature reconvenes Friday, it is expected that there will be a motion in the Senate to bring Senate Bill 135, a medical cannabis bill, back to life. While this motion doesn’t guarantee passage of this bill, or even an actual vote on the bill itself, it will create a record of which legislators do and do not support finding a path forward for medical cannabis.
Sick Kansans continue to suffer as lawmakers shuffle their feet. While I’ve only been impacted by chronic pain for the past few years, many Kansans with far more severe illnesses have been pleading with lawmakers for more than a decade to provide relief to the many Kansas residents whose quality of life would improve with medical cannabis.
Melissa Stiehler is the advocacy director for Loud Light and Loud Light Civic Action, a Kansas-based nonprofit organization focused on civil and voting rights, government transparency and increasing civic engagement. Through its opinion section, the Kansas Reflector works to amplify the voices of people who are affected by public policies or excluded from public debate. Find information, including how to submit your own commentary, here.
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