Originally published April 16 2014
Florida stock broker proves you can use lots of medical marijuana and still be a responsible, productive citizen
by Paul Fassa
(NaturalNews) Meet Irvin Rosenfeld, a South Florida financial consultant and stock broker who openly smokes 10 or so joints daily without legal harassment in a state that still hasn't approved marijuana for medical use. He does this for a rare bone disease and unusual thyroid condition.
He smokes that much pot with impunity and has done so for three decades using marijuana provided by the U.S. Government, the same government that considers any use of marijuana illegal and has jailed pot smokers ruthlessly for decades.
And he's a successful stock broker/financial consultant of 36 years, married with kids and living in the Ft. Lauderdale area of Florida; he also teaches sailing on weekends as a charitable organization volunteer with Shake-A-Leg Miami.
Does this strike you as someone who claims to have smoked more pot than anyone, including his college days and his over 115,000 officially documented joints during his lifetime, and continues promoting medical marijuana as an activist?
Irvin Rosenfeld's story
Irvin was diagnosed with hereditary multiple exostoses (HME) at the age of 10. It's very rare and usually discovered before the age of 12. It involves little bumps or nodules that occur on long bones, which often create pain by irritating surrounding tissue.
As a child, he was subjected to some surgery and other medical treatments with pharmaceuticals that did little for his condition, especially the pain.
In 1971, while in college, Irvin finally discovered his potent palliative medicine, marijuana. He continued using it, but he didn't want to be an outlaw while pursuing a financial career. Yet he wanted the pain and anti-inflammatory relief for his HME as well as continued maintenance of his genetic thyroid condition called pseudohypoparathyroidism.
So he petitioned the government and eventually qualified for a "compassionate protocol" that supplied glaucoma and cancer patients with cannabis from the FDA's Investigational New Drug program.
Irvin began receiving marijuana cigarettes grown and processed from federal government sources in 1982. He was the second patient to be admitted under those compassionate protocol guidelines.
He was once busted but quickly released in Orlando, Florida, a year after starting the program. Since then, Irvin has carried documentation proving his legal status. However, in 1992, the Investigational New Drug Program was disbanded. That was the source of medical marijuana he wanted to keep in order to not be a criminal.
It's rare that someone is able to stand up to the Feds without having his family and home surrounded by paramilitary police. But Irvin has managed to maintain his legal status for medical marijuana in a non-medical marijuana state. He has also survived the longest among the remaining four original compassionate protocol recipients who still receive nicely packed marijuana cigarettes after 28 years.
He also has testified before state governments considering legalizing medical marijuana. How he's managed to convince the government to continue his cannabis supply after the original program was halted is revealed in his book, My Medicine, which he sells from his site (http://irvinrosenfeld.com).
"I don't know that I've broken a record, but I've certainly set one. No one else in the world can document having smoked 115,000 cannabis cigarettes -- let alone the ones I smoked before that. I'm living proof that medical cannabis is real medicine. We need to get medicine in the hands of patients who really need it," Irvin stated. (Emphasis added)
His long tenure as a family man, successful financial consultant and charitable organization volunteer without brain damage defies the "stoner" image so many still hold for those who use marijuana for any reason.
Sources for this article include:
http://healthmaven.blogspot.com
http://abcnews.go.com
http://abcnews.go.com
http://www.shakealegmiami.org
About the author:
Paul Fassa is dedicated to warning others about the current corruption of food and medicine and guiding them towards direction for better health with no restrictions on health freedom.
You can check out his many non-compromising cutting edge, non-fluff articles here http://www.naturalnews.com/Author712.html
And you can visit his blog at http://healthmaven.blogspot.com
Paul Fassa is dedicated to warning others about the current corruption of food and medicine and guiding them towards direction for better health with no restrictions on health freedom.
You can check out his many non-compromising cutting edge, non-fluff articles here http://www.naturalnews.com/Author712.html
And you can visit his blog at http://healthmaven.blogspot.com
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