The legalization of marijuana has quickly become a controversial issue in America. In the United States, the legalization of marijuana for medicinal purposes is spreading at the state level. For example, in November 1996, citizens of California and Arizona voted to legalize marijuana for medical reasons. As a result of Proposition 215 in California, patients now smoke marijuana as long as their doctor recommends its use. A prescription is not required and marijuana continues to be illegal to prescribe. The Clinton administration responded that it “will not recognize these decisions and will prosecute doctors who recommend or provide marijuana to their patients.” Although California and Arizona are the only two states to have already passed laws regulating the use of marijuana, twenty-six states and the District of Columbia have laws and resolutions regarding the use of marijuana. These laws and resolutions range from establishing therapeutic research programs, to allowing doctors to prescribe marijuana, to calling on the federal government to lift prohibition. Despite states' desire to legalize marijuana for medicinal purposes, the US National Institutes of Health reviewed all existing clinical evidence on smoked marijuana and concluded that "there is no scientifically valid evidence that smoked marijuana is superior in terms of from a medical point of view to the therapies currently available". According to the conclusion of the US National Institutes of Health, marijuana should remain illegal. Although it has many medicinal benefits – including improving appetite in chemotherapy and AIDS patients, reducing muscle spasms associated with epilepsy and multiple sclerosis, and relieving eye pressure in glaucoma patients – there is no evidence that marijuana is the most effective treatment. The main active ingredient of marijuana (THC) is already available in its legal form, Marinol; in fact it has therapeutic applications; therefore, the entire substance of marijuana does not need to be legalized. Additionally, marijuana has many side effects that can harm patients. If marijuana were to become legal, multiple legal inconveniences would arise. For example, doctors are very likely to collect kickbacks from healthy patients to prescribe the drug for recreational use. This would make legalization too difficult to regulate because prescriptions could end up in the wrong hands. Additionally, legal marijuana can provide dealers with an easy opportunity to escape prosecution for drug trafficking and dealing. “Reverse psychology” would not work in this situation, because legalizing marijuana would cause more chaos and crime than it would try to prevent..