Watson’s reluctance toward painkillers stems from the category of chronic pain, and the system was not personal experience. A native of northeast Ohio, the designed to do much more than push pills, and those pills Afghanistan War veteran lost two high school friends aren’t working,” said Nick Etten, founder and executive to opioid overdoses and has witnessed firsthand how director of Veterans Cannabis Project, a nonprofit addiction can destroy individuals and their families. organization dedicated to helping military veterans “That area has been devastated with opioid, opiate improve their quality of life through access to cannabis and heroin use. That’s for medical purposes. what’s tearing families Etten, a former Navy apart in this country. SEAL and graduate It’s killing people,” of the U.S. Naval Watson said. Academy, also noted According to that medicinal cannabis a 2017 report is an effective treatment from the National for the signature Center for Health wounds of wars in Statistics, the the Middle East— national opioid crisis post-traumatic stress killed more than disorder and traumatic 42,000 Americans brain injury. He cited in 2016. Alarmingly, pain, sleep and anxiety —Sen. Jon Tester, Senate Veterans’ Affairs Committee a 2013 analysis as the major symptoms ranking member by the Center veterans deal with in for Investigative relation to their service-Reporting found that connected injuries. opioid prescriptions for veterans spiked 270 percent “Cannabis is showing itself to be safe and over a 12-year period, while a 2011 Department of effective in treating those,” he said. “That’s where Veterans Affairs study found that veterans were twice it’s transformative and can be a game-changer.” as likely as the rest of the population to die from an “Before [Jarid] started using [cannabis], he was opioid overdose. constantly complaining about how tense and tight he The VA also estimates that 68,000 veterans—about was and how much his hip hurt,” said Watson’s wife, 13 percent of the total population of veterans currently Priscilla. “The pain would keep him up all night, so taking opioids—have an opioid-use disorder. Yet not only would he wake up in pain, but he’d wake up doctors continue to prescribe them for chronic pain, fatigued and tired and need naps throughout the day. a condition which affects 60 percent of veterans from But now, he sleeps all night and isn’t in pain anymore.” deployments to the Middle East and 50 percent of A nutritional therapist and Air Force veteran herself, older veterans, according to VA officials. Priscilla feels cannabis is a more natural and safer “Sixty percent of what the VA treats can fall into alternative to addressing pain than pharmaceuticals, “ If veterans can ease some of the chronic pain or symptoms of injuries or illness they have received through service to our country without turning to opioids, the VA has a responsibility to research it .” According to the National Center for Health Statistics 42,000 DIED from opioid use in 2016 veterans currently take opioids Veterans are twice as likely as the rest of the population to die from an opioid overdose. 68,000 20 DAV MAGAZINE NOVEMBER | DECEMBER 2018