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The legalisation of medicinal marijuana is gaining momentum in Australia, here in Victoria its captured particular attention as a breakthrough treatment for children suffering from a lifetime of epileptic seizures. To legalise this product lies a complicated road ahead. There is nothing simple about bringing new medication into clinical practice, this is for good reason because their needs to be sufficient evidence to support its effectiveness.

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Thousands of individual’s around Australia are faced with the tough decision to go against the law, to obtain this medication that is not available legally. The individual’s that i am focusing on are the strong parents, that are making a life changing commitment to act in a criminal way to try and improve the quality of life for their children suffering from epilepsy. Little did i know until i searched on google that there were so many families situated right in the middle of this argument.

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So everyones heard of the words weed, 420, hooch, all contrasting words for marijuana, but a lot of people feel puzzled towards the difference between marijuana and medicinal marijuana.Critics often argue that marijuana’s medical benefits are exaggerated by people who just want to use it for fun, but this is far from the truth according to the leaf science website.

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The earliest records of its use come from ancient Chinese and Indian medical texts, in which the plant was described as a medicine with many uses. It’s true that marijuana is often used to get high, which is why it is labeled a recreational drug. The high is caused by a single chemical THC, which only is found in small amounts in medicinal marijuana, although medicinal marijuana is rich in the chemical CBD, which does the opposite to THC, by not activating pathways in the brain that causes a high.

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Tony Bower a previous drug dealer, started experimenting with medicinal marijuana after a motorbike accidence, which left him with severe pain. He started up his own company, Mullways Medical Cannabis which delivers medicinal marijuana across Australia at little or no cost to the customers. Tara O’Connell was his first client, the small dose of marijuana in liquid form supplied by Bower, is what is controlling her debilitating childhood epilepsy which has brought normality back to her parents lives and to that of their daughter, Tara.

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However, her continued access to medicinal marijuana is in jeopardy, with Tony Bower facing a possibility of two years in jail, for growing and supplying this drug. This discovery of an illegal treatment has captured attention within communities around Australia, restoring hope to individuals and families such as the O’Connell’s, so why is the law the one problem stopping other individuals from experiencing this satisfaction towards medicinal marijuana?

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The O’Connell family was one of the many families that i found online that were willing to share via an SBS episode about their story and personal experiences throughout their daughters battle with epilepsy. Tara O’Connell was diagnosed before the age of three with catastrophic epilepsy, suffering between 65 to 200 seizures a day, she began treatment under Dr Paul Carter. He stated in the SBS interview that “Her IQ was being thumped into nothing by the condition and medication she was taking. So it wasn't just that they were dealing with a sick child, they were dealing with a child who was actually becoming sicker and sicker and sicker, they knew that sooner or later she would die of this.”

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A fateful day in 2012 Tara’s mother, Cheri was told that there were no further options for treatment to try, in other words they were basically told to prepare a funeral, just imagine getting told there was nothing else you could for someone you loved. Cheri went looking online for more unorthodox solutions, and this is where she discovered other families in the same situation using medicinal marijuana to control epilepsy. “Our biggest concern was the law…… She was already dying. We couldn't make the situation any worse.”This is when we discovered Tony Bower’s company, Mullways Medical Cannabis.

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The first day Tara took medicinal marijuana her seizures decreased to approx. 10. Ten days later after being on the treatment regime Tara has become seizure free. Dr Carter commented "I know nothing about this medication,All I know is that for the last 14 months, we've had a miracle. This child has gone from disabled, and the whole family focused on her illness, to a normal family and a normal child.” Just think about this If you were in this situation wouldn't you do everything in your power to save your sick child.

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To some it sounds like a miracle, to some it sounds like a cure, it some sounds it like liquid gold so why are Australian authorities threatening to take children away from their parents for giving them medicinal marijuana to. Dr Andrew Rochford commented on the Sunday Night Program “Its not about legalising marijuana thats a completely different argument, its not about people getting stoned this is about using the ingredients in cannabis, that we know work medically, its about being open minded enough to rewrite the laws to offer a specific group of people the best possible care, if that involves medicinal marijuana so be it!”