For immediate release
November 30, 2011
IMMLY: Compassion get another chance with new medical cannabis bill
MADISON: IMMLY Founder Jacki Rickert has been to the Wisconsin State Capitol in Madison many times over the years to support medical cannabis legislation. In 1997, she came via wheelchair from her home in Mondovi on a weeklong “Journey for Justice.” With a bill named after her, “The Jacki Rickert Medical Marijuana Act,” (JRMMA) being reintroduced in the state legislature today, she hoped to attend the press conference bill sponsor Rep. Mark Pocan has scheduled for 1pm in the Assembly Parlor, but is unable due to medical issues.
“This last year has taken me through so many changes,” Rickert says, “it’s time for Wisconsin to change. It’s a win-win situation. Keep people alive, bring money into our state, those are good things. Above all, think triage.”
On the bill itself, Jacki says, “The JRMMA is about real people with real needs. They need it now, not next time. How many people are not going to have a next time? Maybe next time I won’t be around. How many friends have I lost? How many times have I said you will know someone who needs medical cannabis? Things really need to be done to make it a reality. I’ve run out of ways to make sense of the senseless. We do know that it does help.”
IMMLY director of communications, Gary Storck, who will be speaking at the press conference, had this to say, “Wisconsin patients and those who care about them are thrilled that medical cannabis legislation is back. State lawmakers know that medical cannabis is among issues with the most public support. Two years ago at the JRMMA press conference, I said this bill needed to be passed in Jacki’s honor, not her memory. Every day is tough for Jacki and all the other Jacki’s out there. It’s not right that doctors and patients are prevented by law from finding the right medicine when that medicine is cannabis. Wisconsin needs the JRMMA to fulfill our human responsibility to provide compassion to our Seniors, Veterans, the sick, disabled and dying, and to provide new jobs and a new green industry for our state.”
Is My Medicine Legal YET? is a Mondovi and Madison Wisconsin based grass roots patient and caregiver organization dedicated to advancing public education about the medicinal benefits of cannabis. For further information contact Jacki Rickert at 715.926.4950 or Gary Storck at 608.241.8922 or visit the IMMLY website at www.IMMLY.org.
Jacki Rickert & Gary Storck will be speaking at The Seventh National Clinical Conference on Cannabis Therapeutics April 26-28, 2012 at Loews at Ventana Canyon Resort in Tucson, Arizona. Continuing education credits will be available through the University of California's Office of Continuing Medical Education. Visit Patients Out of Time at www.medicalcannabis.com for more information and registration details. |
