Weed Isn't That Bad, United Nations Rules
It looks like the United Nations has gone from hitting shoes to hitting bongs. The intergovernmental organization grew a bit more 420 friendly on Wednesday, after the UN's Commission for Narcotic Drugs voted to remove medical marijuana from a list of the world's most dangerous substances, and it's about high time they made the call.
The Vienna, Austria-based commission, considered a number of The World Health Organizations' recommendations on weed during the vote, (which sadly did not include regularly smoking it), namely the WHO's 2019 suggestion of reclassifying the drug to be less dangerous, removing it from 1961's Single Convention on Narcotic Drugs, which includes dangerous opiates like heroin. Although any stoner could tell you this was definitely the right call, the decision proved very controversial, leading the vote to be pushed back. Despite this commotion, which drug policy researcher, Kenzi Riboulet-Zemouli, described as " ... a diplomatic circus," the measure ultimately passed 27 to 25, with the United States and some European countries voting in favor of reclassification, as China, Egypt, Nigeria, Pakistan, and Russia all cast ballots against relaxing the international group's stance on weed.
Although not everyone was excited about the vote's results, with China's delegate saying their nation would maintain their tight cannabis policies "to protect from the harm and abuse," Riboulet-Zemouli, says it's a monumental decision. "This is a huge, historic victory for us, we couldn't hope for more," he told the paper.
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While the vote, which also rejected a measure to include THC may not have any immediate impacts experts say, citing the fact that governments control how their countries manage marijuana legalization or lack thereof, but the ruling could BLAZE the path for broader cannabis research and medical use according to the New York Times.
Sounds lit to me. We'll (legally) smoke to that.
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