Dr. William J. Courtney is an evangelist for the medicinal use of non-psychoactive, RAW cannabis.
Cannabis a.k.a. hemp is not psychoactive unless it is dried, cooked or burned, prior to injestion. While still raw, however it does not affect the cognition or motor skills of its user and therefore, it can be taken in doses 60 times greater than burned cannabis. It is at these doses that cannabis becomes among the most anti-inflammatory compounds ever discovered with medicinal applications for dozens of illnesses.
Courtney believes that hemp/cannabis needs to be re-categorized as a green leafy vegetable that should be consumed every day as a nutritional supplement by those afflicted by painful inflammatory conditions like arthritis, IBS, etc.
Dr. Donald Abrams, MD, Chief Hematology and Oncology at San Francisco General Hospital asserts that if cannabis were just discovered in the Amazon, people would be clamoring to make uses out of it - but instead, it suffers from the stigma of a "street drug" and worse - from the stiff legal sanctions against its possession or use in many states and countries.
Courtney says that the FDA, which owns a patent on cannabis recognizing its medicinal value should change its current status as a Schedule I narcotic with no accepted medical uses, as these two positions are in stark contradiction with one another.