New York Judge, Gustin L. Reichbach, admitted using marijuana to relieve pain from pancreatic cancer and has requested NY legislature and governor to legalize medical marijuana.

Reichbach was diagnosed with pancreatic cancer 3 years ago. He said that the doctors had told him that he would live for 4-6 months.

“Inhaled marijuana is the only medicine that gives me some relief from nausea, stimulates my appetite, and makes it easier to fall asleep. The oral synthetic substitute, Marinol, prescribed by my doctors, was useless,” writes Reichbach in The New York Times, “rather than watch the agony of my suffering, friends have chosen, at some personal risk, to provide the substance.”

He said that he uses marijuana before dinner as it gives him “the ammunition in the battle to eat”. And a few puffs before bed gives him the desperately needed sleep.

“States that legalized medical marijuana had higher rates of marijuana use. Future research needs to examine whether the association is causal, or is due to an underlying common cause, such as community norms supportive of the legalization of medical marijuana and of marijuana use,” writes Magdalena Cerdá in the journal Drug and Alcohol Dependence. They had studied the relationship between state level approval of marijuana and its use.

Currently 16 states in U.S. have legalized medical marijuana. Some countries too have recognized the use of marijuana in medicine.

A Cambridge study back in 1990 revealed that almost half of the doctor’s surveyed said they would give marijuana to patients if it were made legal. 44 percent of doctors actually had recommended marijuana to at least one cancer patient receiving chemotherapy, the study says.

“I implore the governor and the Legislature of New York, always considered a leader among states, to join the forward and humane thinking of 16 other states and pass the medical marijuana bill this year. Medical science has not yet found a cure, but it is barbaric to deny us access to one substance that has proved to ameliorate our suffering,” wrote Reichbach in the in The New York Times.