To the Editor:
I appreciate the recent public-spirited expression by Cannabis Task Force (CTF) member Kimberly Levitt, MD, MPH [“Banning Cannabis Dispensaries Hurts Adults Who Have Legally Made the Choice to Use It,” Mailbox, March 23].
Dr. Leavitt is a local family physician and acupuncturist who laudibly wants to advance the interest of public health as she sees it. But her reasoning seems illogical and suggests for a public health expert like herself an inexplicable predisposition favoring retail shops selling a indisputably psychoactive substance demonstrably harmful to the health of many.
First, the presence or absence of retail marijuana shops in Princeton in no way will influence cannabis research and a local doctor’s capacity to give the best possible advice from the medical literature on cannabis. Second, while the lack of tested products makes harder her ability to advise, this also has nothing to do with marijuana shops in Princeton. Ironically, such lack is a matter that she as a public health expert should insist the CTF itself address before any shops are permitted anywhere. more