MEDICAL MARIJUANA DEAD BUT STILL BEING DISCUSSED

Legislative leaders welcome efforts to educate lawmakers about the medicinal merits of marijuana but the practice is not going to be legalized any time soon. House Majority Leader Linda Upmeyer, R-Clear Lake, a nurse practitioner, said medical experts and family members of suffering patients have made a “compelling argument” about the therapeutic benefits of marijuana treatments for seizures and other forms of chronic pain that should not be dismissed. Senate Majority Leader Mike Gronstal, D-Council Bluffs, agreed, but said there remains a number of Iowans who are resistant to doing anything in that area and he expected that “if the Legislature goes down that path” the availability of medicinal marijuana would be highly limited and “pretty severely restricted.” He called the likelihood of a legislative consensus emerging “a long shot.”