Any changes to Iowa’s marijuana policies will not come this legislative session. That is the resigned message of State Sen. Joe Bolkcom (D-Iowa City), who recently introduced a bill to implement a system based off of New Mexico’s Medical Cannabis Program.

Bolkcom’s bill was dead on arrival in the Iowa Senate, since so many lawmakers — from both sides of the aisle — simply have no stomach for serious discourse on the benefits of marijuana as medicine. Avoiding the issue at all costs can certainly help keep a legislator out of controversy, but with a 2010 Des Moines Register poll finding 64 percent of Iowans support a medical marijuana program, it is perplexing that so few Iowa legislators have signed on with the idea.

On top of the lack of support in our legislature, Iowa Gov. Terry Branstad is squarely opposed to reforms of Iowa’s marijuana policies. After an ACLU report pegged Iowa as having the most racial inequality for marijuana arrests, Branstad did call for a review of our arrest policies. He stopped far short, however, of accepting a discussion on decriminalization, saying such a change would be “a little bit like killing an ant with a sledgehammer.”

The Iowa Board of Pharmacy has also been dragged into the medical marijuana debate, after having unanimously recommended years ago that marijuana may very well have medical benefits. Currently, however, marijuana is a Schedule I drug in Iowa, meaning it has no accepted medical benefits, on top of having a “high abuse potential.”

There are those in Iowa that refuse to become discouraged, though. A group of Iowa mothers, for example, have made their faces and voices known around the capitol building. Maria La France, whose son Quincy is currently at the mercy of epileptic seizures, spoke before the Iowa Board of Pharmacy this past January to urge them to recommend reclassifying marijuana, therefore putting pressure on those in the statehouse that refuse to admit to marijuana’s potential medical benefits.

Sally Gaer, wife to West Des Moines’ republican mayor Steve Gaer, has also taken up the cause for medical marijuana in Iowa. The Gaers’ daughter, Margaret, suffers from Dravet Syndrome, which causes frequent, violent seizures. The families of both Maraget Gaer and Quincy La France hope that their children could benefit from products of marijuana, not from smoking the raw plant, as most recreational users do.

Those products include the compound cannabidiol, also known as CBD, a liquid that does not get users high, but may reduce the frequency and intensity of seizures. The FDA announced this past fall that two trials will be held to assess the impact of CBD and its pharmaceutical form, Epidiolex.

Another Iowan, Benton Mackenzie, is also hoping, albeit not too strongly, for relief in the form of legal recognition of marijuana’s medical benefits. Having been diagnosed with terminal angiosarcoma, a form of cancer where tumors grow on blood or lymphatic vessels, Mackenzie was arrested last summer for growing marijuana plants, although he claims to use the plants and their hemp oil only for medicinal purposes.

There are doubts that Mackenzie will ever get to make his case, as he may not live long enough to attend his June 2 trial without the medicine that he says was helping his condition.

Iowa’s Senate Minority Leader, Bill Dix (R-Shell Rock), has claimed that he and other Senate republicans are open to the issue. Those of us in Iowa who recognize the benefits of medical marijuana need to hold Dix to his word. Although it is exceedingly unlikely that any real reforms will come this year, opening the discussion and making all involved listen is half the battle.

The fear that any tolerance of medical marijuana or marijuana products will lead to a stoner’s paradise is both misguided and uninformed. Yes, some states have had problems keeping medical marijuana products in the hands of those that actually need them, but that is no reason for Iowa to back down from doing what is right.

And make no mistake, what is right is for Iowa to ensure access to needed medicines for its citizens, not undertake senseless political posturing.