A whopping eight in 10 marijuana consumers say they use cannabis, at least in part, as an alternative to traditional prescription drugs, according to a new poll.
The survey from the cannabis telehealth platform NuggMD, which was shared exclusively with Marijuana Moment, asked cannabis consumers a simple question: “Do you use cannabis as a replacement for prescription medication?”
Of the 485 respondents, 79.6 percent affirmed that they did, in fact, use marijuana as a substitute to pharmaceuticals, compared to 20.4 percent who said they did not.
“Pharmaceutical interests know the substitution effect cannabis has on their products is real,” Andrew Graham, head of communications at NuggMD, told Marijuana Moment. “Federal prohibition locks in a lot of demand for their addictive and potentially fatal drugs by depriving millions of Americans of legal access to the plant, and I can’t name a single interest aligned with Big Pharma that’s stated support for ending it.”
“Our newest poll shows the substitution effect may well be a lot higher than the pharma industry thinks that it is,” he said. “It estimates that around 40 million Americans use cannabis to some degree as a replacement for prescription drugs. That’s costing Big Pharma billions annually in lost profits.”
“I genuinely want Big Pharma to see this data and decide to spend yet more resources fighting against the plant. Because the more noise they make against cannabis, the more popular our movement becomes. They are that unpopular,” Graham added.
Notably, a majority of respondents in the survey sample did not report having a state medical cannabis card, indicating that the substitution effect extends beyond the registered patient population.
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