SALT LAKE CITY — Gov. Gary Herbert said Thursday he's open to legalizing marijuana in Utah for medical use.

"I'm open to the idea of medical marijuana and the discussion of how it can be used as a medicine based on science, and making sure we have good, collaborative efforts so we can answer the questions that are out there," the governor said.

Herbert said during the taping of his monthly news conference on KUED Ch. 7 that the state has "a history of looking at opportunities, for medical purposes, to bring substances on board that maybe historically have not been traditional medicine."

He cited cannabis oil, approved by lawmakers a year ago, as "helping people who have had seizures, and seems to be demonstrating scientifically there is some benefit."

SALT LAKE CITY — A controversial bill that would allow medical marijuana to be sold and distributed in Utah will return to the state legislature this year.

The intended audience is clear from the start of a new medical marijuana promotion video by state Sen. Mark Madsen.

"My name is Mark Benson Madsen," says the Saratoga Springs Republican, grandson of Ezra Taft Benson, 13th president of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.

"My grandfather was my hero and my friend long before I knew that he had been the secretary of agriculture or was a member of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles," Madsen says.

Madsen's bill proposing medical cannabis failed by one vote in the Senate this year, and he knows he'll need to appeal to conservative Utah Mormon voters and his colleagues in the Legislature to support the measure next session.

We know the end is coming, but pot prohibition is going to have to be undone state by state. Here are the ones least likely to jump on the bandwagon.

Marijuana prohibition in the US is dying, but it isn't going to vanish in one fell swoop. Even if Congress were to repeal federal pot prohibition, state laws criminalizing the plant and its users would still be in effect—at least in some states.

And it's probably a pretty safe bet that Congress isn’t going to act until a good number of states, maybe more than half, have already legalized it. That process is already underway and is likely to gather real momentum by the time election day 2016 is over.

SPANISH FORK, Utah – This Mormon mother, Tenille Farr, was diagnosed with state-2 Hodgkin’s Lymphoma when she was pregnant with her fifth child, Gabe.

Instead of going through chemotherapy and risking losing her baby, she left her family to treat naturally treat her cancer in Colorado and California where medical cannabis is legal.

According to IllegallyHealed.com, Farr used cannabis oil treat her symptoms and deliver a healthy baby boy, the family’s fifth son.

Her emotional video showing her journey and support for legalizing medical cannabis has been posted to YouTube with the following description:

NEW YORK (MainStreet) — It appears that the DEA will stop at nothing to slow down and frustrate medical marijuana reform. That said, the latest "health warning" from the agency, this time in Utah, borders on the bizarre.

Special Agent Matt Fairbanks, a member of Utah's DEA marijuana eradication team, told a state panel of lawmakers in early March that stoned bunnies pose a major threat to public safety and as a result, should impede the current cannabis legalization initiative now the table in the state authorizing medical use for specific conditions.

Utah's Republican-controlled Senate rejected a bill Monday night allowing those with chronic and debilitating diseases to consume edible medical marijuana products.

Senators voted 15-14 against the proposal, citing concerns about unintended consequences and trouble with the language that they said needed to be studied later this year.

Saratoga Springs Republican Sen. Mark Madsen sponsored the bill, which would have forbidden the smoking of marijuana but allowed businesses to grow marijuana and sell pot-infused products such as brownies, candy and lozenges.

The state of Utah is considering a bill that would allow the sale of edible marijuana for medical use. One DEA agent is actually speaking out against the proposal, because he believes rabbits will eat the marijuana plants and get high. In fact, there’s a whole new fake ad campaign we made up specifically targeted at rabbits on pot.

SALT LAKE CITY — New poll results indicate that a strong majority of Utahns support medical cannabis, with widespread support across every demographic. A Y2 Analytics Poll (see topline results here) shows that 72% of likely voters in Utah believe certain doctors should be able to recommend medical cannabis to their patients with serious conditions—an even higher number of Utahns support Healthy Utah or "Right to Try" legislation that has received near-unanimous support from the legislature.

Additional findings from the poll, jointly sponsored by Drug Policy Project of Utah and Libertas Institute, include:

Utah is considering a bill that would allow patients with certain debilitating conditions to be treated with edible forms of marijuana. If the bill passes, the state's wildlife may "cultivate a taste" for the plant, lose their fear of humans, and basically be high all the time. That's according to testimony presented to a Utah Senate panel (time stamp 58:00) last week by an agent of the Drug Enforcement Administration.

"I deal in facts. I deal in science," said special agent Matt Fairbanks, who's been working in the state for a decade. He is member of the "marijuana eradication" team in Utah. Some of his colleagues in Georgia recently achieved notoriety by raiding a retiree's garden and seizing a number of okra plants.