It should be legalized. We need to strive for a rational legal code. In relation to tobacco and alcohol, two of the legal drugs, cannabis is hands down the least harmful. It does not have the physically addictive properties of either alcohol or tobacco, cannabis users can stop anytime with withdrawal symptoms on par with or less than that of caffeine withdrawal. More than that, tens of thousands of people die every year from lung cancer and alcohol related accidents and illnesses. If your an alcoholic you can die if you just stop drinking. No one to my knowledge has ever been killed from smoking or quiting cannabis. In addition, cannabis has not been shown to have the carcinogenic effects that tobacco has. Cannabis has even been shown to promote new brain cell development, and its users report wide ranging benefits. The Netherlands model shows that soft drugs can be legalized and it actually improves the society. We need to end the propaganda and misinformation campaign, bring more reason and fairness to our legal code, and legalize cannabis.

A few points. The best outcome for the patient would be to have lowered cholesterol without taking any medication. So the focus should be on encouraging fitness and proper nutrition. If the situation is acute and dangerous, medication may be employed until the patient's cholesterol is out of a danger zone. But if the patient really wants to be healthy, no drug will give him that. He has to do that himself by exercising daily and eating well. I think the health care providers job is to try to move him to that goal.

To the point of natural vs synthetic. Of course there are many dangerous and toxic naturally occurring substances, but that doesn't say anything about the difference between synthetic drugs and naturally occurring herbal medicine. I think the subjective difference is obvious to anybody who has taken an effective herbal drug vs a synthetic one. Maybe one day science will be able to create substances and medicines that are as complex as those found in nature, but we're not there yet. Herbal medicines work, but you really need to find a good herbalist though, buying herbal remedies at the grocery store without really knowing what you're doing won't really work most the time.