New federal guidelines are now in place stating that the Veterans' Affairs Hospitals and Clinics located in states where medical marijuana is legal will now allow their patients to use marijuana for pain management.
Several changes to the hospitals and clinics are necessary to accommodate this new ruling, the most critical of which is to make sure that those patients using marijuana have a ready supply of various snacks on hand to combat the raging munchies associated with marijuana use.
Most everyone who has had to deal with the sometimes unpleasant side effects of taking medical marijuana (chortle, chortle, snicker, snicker, cough, cough) knows that having only sweets on hand will not suffice. The normal craving will have cycles beginning with a craving for something like a candy bar, a bag of M&M's or an ice cream bar and then will change almost immediately to a craving for something salty like potato chips or a bowl of ramen noodles.
Said a VA official, "the key to a successful pain management program where marijuana is used is having an overabundance of munchies on hand to satisfy users' cravings."
The VA is now accepting bids from various snack producers, and it expects to award government contracts in the very near future. In the meantime, additional snack machines have been placed throughout the hospitals and clinics to help alleviate some of the discomfort associated with having the munchies. In addition, extra soda and juice machines are being installed to combat cotton mouth.
