Pubdate: Wed, 25 Jul 2012
Source: Sacramento Bee (CA)
Copyright: 2012 The Sacramento Bee
Contact: http://mapinc.org/url/0n4cG7L1
Website: http://www.sacbee.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/376
Author: Paul Armentano

SCIENCE SUPPORTING MEDICINAL POT IS CLEAR

A dozen years ago, California lawmakers did something extraordinary. 
They authorized investigators throughout California to conduct a 
series of FDA-approved, gold standard trials to assess whether 
cannabis is safe and effective as a medicine.

In all, researchers conducted more than a dozen clinical studies 
examining whether cannabis could meet objective standards of safety 
and therapeutic efficacy. For example, investigators at the 
University of California, San Francisco, assessed whether vaporizing 
cannabis could rapidly and consistently deliver the plant's active 
ingredients to patients in a manner that is far safer than smoking. 
It could. At UC San Diego, clinicians examined whether inhaling 
cannabis posed potential harms to the immune system, particularly in 
subjects suffering from immune-compromised conditions like HIV. It 
didn't. And at universities throughout the state, investigators 
studied whether marijuana provided statistically significant relief 
in a number of hard-to-treat conditions, such as multiple sclerosis 
and neuropathic (nerve) pain. Cannabis did so  consistently.

Summarizing the results of California's novel, nearly $9 million 
medical cannabis research program in the Open Neurology Journal, the 
program's director, Dr. Igor Grant of UC San Diego wrote: "Based on 
evidence currently available, the (federal) Schedule I classification 
(of cannabis) is not tenable; it is not accurate that cannabis has no 
medical value, or that information on safety is lacking."

Nonetheless, policymakers  particularly those in Washington  have 
responded to these most recent scientific findings with no more than 
a collective yawn. Despite pledging to let "science and the 
scientific process ... inform and guide decisions of my 
administration," neither President Barack Obama nor Congress have 
taken any steps to amend federal law or federal policy to reflect the 
scientific reality that marijuana possesses well-established 
therapeutic value. In fact, this administration has taken just the 
opposite approach.

In 2011, the Obama administration quashed out-of-hand an 
administrative petition that sought federal hearings regarding the 
present classification of cannabis as a substance with "no currently 
accepted medical use in treatment in the United States." In its 
rejection, the administration alleged, "The drug's chemistry is not 
known and reproducible; there are no adequate safety studies; there 
are no adequate and well-controlled studies proving efficacy; the 
drug is not accepted by qualified experts; and the scientific 
evidence is not widely available."

Yet, the findings from California's 12-year-old study program show 
that each of these claims is demonstrably false.

Of course, when it comes to marijuana policy in the United States, 
science has never played a significant role. This reality is unlikely 
to change any time soon. Speaking to the New York Times in 2010, a 
spokesman for the National Institute on Drug Abuse  one of the 
primary agencies involved in crafting U.S. drug policy  acknowledged: 
"As the National Institute on Drug Abuse, our focus is primarily on 
the negative consequences of marijuana use. We generally do not fund 
research focused on the potential beneficial medical effects of 
marijuana." Even more alarming, a 2011 White House report affirmed 
that only 14 researchers in the United States possess the legal 
permission to even conduct research assessing the effect of inhaled 
cannabis in human subjects.

"Change we can believe in?" Hardly. More like: "See no evil; hear no evil."

It is long past time to reject the notion that we as a society 
possess insufficient evidence regarding the safety and efficacy of 
cannabis. The truth is that we know plenty. Most of all we know that 
there remains no valid scientific reason to justify the continued 
targeting, prosecution and incarceration of those Americans who 
consume cannabis responsibly.
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MAP posted-by: Jay Bergstrom