Patients Want Medical Marijuana: How Ohio's 90% Support Became Law

The numbers were staggering and the stories were heartbreaking. By 2016, 90% of Ohio voters supported legalizing medical marijuana, a level of consensus almost unheard of on any policy issue. Behind that number were real patients and families who had spent years traveling to other states, navigating unregulated markets, or watching their children suffer through dozens of medications that did not work while a treatment that did remained illegal.

Their advocacy changed Ohio law. This is the story of how patient voices turned a 90% polling majority into the 25th medical marijuana program in the nation.

The Polling: A Consensus Without Precedent

The data left no room for political ambiguity.

A Quinnipiac University poll released in May 2016 found that 90% of Ohio voters supported allowing adults to legally use marijuana for medical purposes if their doctor prescribed it. Support was not concentrated in any single demographic. It crossed party lines, age groups, geographic regions, and income levels. There was essentially no political constituency in Ohio that opposed medical marijuana.

An earlier Quinnipiac poll from February 2014 had shown 87% support with an 87-11 margin, with no demographic group below 78% support.

A Public Policy Polling (PPP) survey from February 2016 found 74% of Ohio voters favored allowing patients with terminal or debilitating conditions to possess and consume marijuana with a doctor's recommendation. The lower number reflected the more specific policy framing, but even 74% represented a commanding majority.

Critically, support for medical marijuana was dramatically higher than support for recreational legalization, which polled around 52% in the same surveys. This distinction mattered. It meant that medical marijuana was not a proxy for broader legalization. Ohioans drew a clear line between patients accessing medicine and recreational use, and they supported patient access overwhelmingly.

For legislators who had spent years avoiding the issue, the polling data eliminated the political risk of action and replaced it with the political risk of inaction. Opposing medical marijuana meant opposing 90% of your constituents.

The Patients Who Made It Real

Numbers moved the political needle. Patient stories moved hearts. In early 2016, the Ohio House of Representatives convened a Medical Marijuana Task Force, chaired by State Representative Kirk Schuring, to hear testimony from patients, physicians, policy experts, and opponents. What they heard from patients was, in the words of one legal observer, "unrefuted."

Sophia Nazzarine: The Girl Whose Seizures Stopped

Sophia Nazzarine was diagnosed with epilepsy at eight months old. By age five, she had undergone three brain surgeries and had a vagus nerve stimulator implanted in her chest. She was on multiple medications simultaneously. None of them controlled her seizures. She experienced 10 to 20 seizures every day.

Her father, Scott Nazzarine, researched CBD (cannabidiol), a non-intoxicating compound in cannabis that research had shown could calm overactive electrical signals in the brain. The family traveled to Colorado, where medical marijuana was legal. Within three days of receiving high-CBD, low-THC cannabis treatment, Sophia's seizures stopped completely.

Scott Nazzarine became one of the most visible advocates for HB 523. He wrote directly to Governor Kasich, testified before legislative committees, and spoke to media outlets across the state. When Kasich ultimately signed the bill on June 8, 2016, he cited helping children in pain as a motivating factor. Sophia's story was a significant part of that calculus.

J.P. Schneider: 16 Medications, None Worked

Sue Schneider testified on behalf of her 15-year-old son J.P., who suffered from Dravet Syndrome, a severe form of epilepsy that is resistant to conventional treatments. J.P. had been prescribed 16 different medications over his lifetime. The side effects included cerebral atrophy and organ damage. Despite all of it, the seizures continued.

Schneider's testimony illustrated a reality that many legislators had not considered: for patients with drug-resistant conditions, medical marijuana was not an alternative to effective treatment. It was the only remaining option after everything else had failed.

Waylon Cordle: 17,000 Pills a Year

Ten-year-old Waylon Cordle's parents shared that their son required approximately 17,000 pills annually to slow, not stop, his epileptic seizures. The sheer volume of medication a child was consuming, with limited effectiveness, made a powerful argument for allowing families to explore cannabis-based treatments.

Robert Ryan: A Cancer Survivor Leads the Patient Network

Robert Ryan, a Blue Ash councilman and three-time cancer survivor, helped found the Ohio Patient Network and became a leading voice for medical marijuana access. Ryan's advocacy was distinctive because he brought both personal medical experience and political credibility. As an elected official who had survived cancer three times, his testimony carried weight with legislators who might have dismissed other advocates as single-issue activists.

Lucy Scholten: 100 Seizures a Day

Lucy Scholten, a 12-year-old with drug-resistant epilepsy, experienced approximately 100 seizures daily. No currently available treatment controlled them. Her family's testimony before the task force underscored the urgency of the issue: for patients like Lucy, every day without access to a potentially effective treatment was a day of suffering that could have been avoided.

The Task Force Hearings

The Medical Marijuana Task Force held seven hearings across Ohio in early 2016, creating a public record that made the case for legalization nearly impossible to refute.

Expert testimony came from physicians including Dr. Sue Sisley, a nationally recognized researcher conducting FDA-approved clinical trials on cannabis for PTSD; Dr. Matt Noyes, an orthopedic surgeon who testified about using cannabis to reduce post-surgical opioid dependence; and Dr. Anup Patel of Nationwide Children's Hospital, who presented research on purified CBD compounds for severe childhood epilepsy.

Policy testimony included Commissioner Deborah Miran from Maryland's Medical Cannabis Commission and Dr. Malik Burnett from Johns Hopkins University, who provided frameworks for how Ohio could structure a well-regulated program.

Opposition testimony was sparse. Captain Jeffrey Orr of the Trumbull County Sheriff's Office raised law enforcement concerns, and organizations like Prevention First argued that more research was needed. But the opposition was dramatically outnumbered and outmatched by the volume and specificity of proponent testimony.

The task force hearings also featured three public town halls in communities across Ohio, giving everyday residents the opportunity to speak. The message was consistent: patients wanted access, and they wanted it now.

From Testimony to Law

The combination of 90% polling support, devastating patient testimony, and a well-organized ballot initiative campaign created irresistible pressure on the Ohio General Assembly. The legislature passed HB 523 in May 2016 with bipartisan margins (71-25 in the House, 19-15 in the Senate), and Governor Kasich signed it on June 8, 2016.

The Ohioans for Medical Marijuana campaign had been collecting signatures for a constitutional amendment that would have included broader provisions, including home cultivation and employment protections. The campaign suspended its effort after the legislature acted, calling HB 523 "a moderately good piece of legislation" that was "a step forward."

The patients who testified did not get everything they asked for. HB 523 banned smoking and home growing, included fewer qualifying conditions than the ballot initiative proposed, and provided no workplace protections. But it established legal access to medical cannabis in Ohio, and the program it created has been serving patients ever since.

What Patients Built: Ohio's Program in 2026

The advocacy that drove Ohio's 2016 law has produced a program that now serves hundreds of thousands:

• Over 467,000 patients have registered since the program launched
• $3.52 billion in total cannabis sales through early 2026
• 199 dual-use dispensaries across the state
• 26 qualifying conditions now recognized (expanded from the original 21)
• $0.01 state registration fee
• Telehealth evaluations available statewide
• 518 physicians with active Certificates to Recommend

The patients who testified before the task force in 2016 did not just help pass a law. They helped build an institution that has provided legal, regulated access to medical cannabis for nearly a decade.

Get Your Ohio Medical Marijuana Card

If you have a qualifying condition, the patients who fought for this program made it possible for you to access medical cannabis legally. Getting your Ohio medical marijuana card through MMJ.com takes minutes:

1. Schedule a same-day telehealth appointment
2. Connect with a licensed Ohio physician via phone or video
3. Get certified and registered the same day
4. Visit any Ohio dispensary and save 10% vs. recreational

$149.99 evaluation. 100% money-back guarantee.

Already have a card? Renewing your Ohio medical marijuana card is fast and affordable with Ohio's $0 state fee.

The 90% of Ohioans who supported medical marijuana in 2016 included patients who had been waiting years for legal access. The families who testified, the physicians who presented evidence, and the advocates who organized the campaign all contributed to a law that, despite its imperfections, has changed the lives of hundreds of thousands of Ohio patients.

Get your Ohio medical marijuana card today.

Sources

• Quinnipiac University Poll, Ohio Voter Support for Medical Marijuana, May 2016 and February 2014
• Public Policy Polling, Ohio Medical Marijuana Survey, February 2016
• The Toledo Blade, "Poll shows 90 percent support in Ohio for legalized medical marijuana," May 2016
• Cincinnati Enquirer, "Patients: We want medical marijuana," May 2016
• Columbus Dispatch, "Parents, patients advocate to legalize medical marijuana in Ohio," April 2016
• WLWT Cincinnati, "Family wants medical marijuana legalized to treat girl's epilepsy," 2016
• JD Supra/Benesch, Medical Marijuana Task Force testimony reports, February-March 2016
• Ohio House of Representatives, Medical Marijuana Task Force proceedings, 2016
• Ohio Department of Commerce, Division of Cannabis Control Update, February 2026