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Six Years Old And Taking Weed Every Day
Other | Monday 12th August 2013 | Christina
The Six Year Old Whose Parents Are Happy For Her To Have Marijuana Every Single Day
A six year old is probably the last person you'd imagine when asked to picture an average marijuana user. It's probably even less likely that you'd picture a six year old marijuana user whose parents are thrilled at the prospect.
Well this six year old exists. Her name is Charlotte Figi and she takes weed every single day.
Ok so it might not be what you're thinking, she doesn't exactly sit around smoking joints with her all her friends in the playground. Six year old Charlotte suffers a rare form of epilepsy. After her parents tried and tested all sorts of treatments to cure her three hundred plus seizures a week, including various medications and even a diet consisting of pine cones, they decided to try cannabis.
The medicinal form of the drug that Charlotte uses comes in an oil, which means little Charlotte isn't actually smoking the green stuff. Her parents believe the treatment to be the best method of easing her seizures, bringing them down from over three hundred a week to just two or three. Best of all, the marijuana has brought about a positive change in both Charlotte's physical abilities and social interactions. From initially not being able to walk, talk or even swallow, Charlotte can now dance, paint and play like any other girl her age should have the chance to do. Now she even enjoys physical activities such as skiing and horse riding.
It's not just Charlotte that benefits from this treatment. In Colorado, children as young as one are also benefitting from the treatment. The custom developed strain that is used to treat Charlotte and other young children has been appropriately named 'Charlotte's Web', after the girl whose life it has helped to change. The company who developed this specific strain of the drug has also set up a non-profit charity, 'Realm of Caring', to help desperate parents who too want to help their children, by encouraging and paying for families to move to Colorado where the use of Marijuana has been made legal.
Charlotte's case has helped to fuel the already big debate in America as to whether or not the drug should be made legal under federal law. A number of U.S states have already decriminalized the drug but to varying degrees. Where states such as California and Hawaii among others allow the sale of marijuana for medical use only, in 2012 both Colorado and Washington legalised the recreational use of the drug.
It may be a controversial form of medication, especially in the case of children as young as Charlotte but so long as it's changing lives for the better, who cares?
Christina Hirst
