Marijuana: The New Medicine of the NFL

It isn’t uncommon to hear about a football player getting a concussion or a seriously painful injury during their football career. That is why former players such as Nate Jackson of the Cincinnati Bengals are calling for a change in the NFL, and the way they handle their marijuana policy.

During Jackson’s football career, he has suffered painful injuries like a broken tibia, fingers, ribs, dislocated shoulders and suffered a concussion (just to name a few). He wanted to stay clear of prescribed painkillers to avoid addiction and began self-medicating himself with marijuana.

In an opinion article Jackson wrote for The New York Times, he described marijuana a better approach than the pill and needle injections that the NFL pushes.

“VIRTUALLY every single player in the N.F.L. has a certifiable need for medical marijuana,” Jackson said.

In writing this article, Jackson brought to light the negatives of painkillers in the NFL, and the effects it has had on the players. He called for the NFL and the NFL Players Association to “rethink” their approach to the marijuana policy, and to some extent they did.

Jackson’s article led to the DEA investigating doctors who prescribed professional players these

restricted drugs. In addition to the DEA investigation, the NFL changed their marijuana tolerance policy from 15 nanograms per liter of blood- which was so low that being around someone smoking marijuana would cause positive test results- to 35 nanograms per liter of blood.

Dr. Lester Grinspoon, Harvard Medical professor, and author wrote a letter to NFL commissioner Roger Goodell asking to fund research to into finding out if cannabis can provide treatment to Chronic Traumatic Encephalopathy. CTE is a progressive disease that can be found in athletes with a history of brain trauma, including concussions.

So far Goodell and the NFL have not started supporting the research.

Obviously, marijuana can and has been used for medicinal purposes, so when are companies like the NFL going to do what’s best for its players and allow proper medicinal use? Hopefully, it’s sometime soon.