Israeli law prohibits the cultivation, possession and sale of the drug.
The six-member committee is to comprise doctors, jurists and public officials. Lev's initiative was spurred by an increase in public appeals to the ministry to legalize marijuana as a prescription medical drug, and by the work of a Knesset committee on drug use headed by Meretz MK Naomi Chazan. Prof. Zvi Bentwich, who is in charge of AIDS treatment at Rehovot's Kaplan Hospital and who has been tapped to serve on the committee, said he supports the use of marijuana as a prescription drug. Bentwich said his 15 years of experience with AIDS had shown that marijuana can have a particularly salubrious effect on patients, and that smoking the drug helped cut down on nausea and weight-loss. We do not own nor are responsible for visitor comments.