The President of the National Wrestling Alliance, attorney R. Bruce Tharpe, is one of the first sports leaders publicly advocating the use of cannabis as a legitimate medical alternative for injured wrestlers and other athletes.
Here is Tharpe’s statement:
“Too many people in the US have become victims of opioid addiction and death as a result of the over-prescription of pain medications and pharmaceuticals by doctors. Unfortunately, over the years we have seen a large number of untimely deaths as a direct result of prescription drug use, and many of those deaths may have been avoided had the medicinal use of cannabis been legalized and more widely accepted.
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“It is clear that cannabis / CBD has been used to successfully treat such afflictions as children suffering from epileptic seizures, PTSD in veterans who have served in Afghanistan and Iraq, cancer patients experiencing the severe nausea associated with chemotherapy, glaucoma patients and those who suffer severe pain due to arthritis, fibromyalgia, etc.
“I think it’s important for the owners of legitimate sports franchises like the NFL, the NBA and the NBL and for sports entertainment groups like the WWE to stand up and take an honest look at cannabis as a legitimate form of alternative medicine.
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“The negative stigma of marijuana use needs to disappear in this country. That’s why the National Wrestling Alliance is taking a progressive public position toward the advocacy of medicinal cannabis use by wrestlers and other athletes for the treatment of pain.”
The National Wrestling Alliance is the oldest and largest sanctioning body in professional wrestling, founded in 1948.
