Dr. Tod Mikuriya’s 1995 study, “Cannabis Medicinal Uses at a ‘Buyers” Club,” was never published —but it is historically significant. The paper resides as a manuscript in the Mikuriya collection at the National Library of Medicine. We are grateful to John Rees of the NLM for providing the pdf.
Mikuriya had interviewed 57 members of Dennis Peron’s San Francisco Cannabis Buyers’ Club (51 men, 41 HIV+) when the club was located at the corner of Church and 14th Streets. He used a structured questionnaire to document the wide range of symptoms reportedly alleviated by cannabis: Insomnia, depression, anxiety, panic attacks, arthritis and other pain, alcoholism… (See illustration.)
“Tod may not have written the line in Prop 215 that allows use for ‘any other condition for which marijuana provides relief,'” says Dale Gieringer, a principal author of the ballot initiative by which Californians legalized the herb for medical use in 1996. “But his study of SFCBC members provided the data to support it.”
Rich Gerharter photographed Mikuriya interviewing patients in January 1994—with Dennis Peron and Brownie Mary in foreground.
