Pubdate: Wed, 11 Feb 2015
Source: Washington Post (DC)
Copyright: 2015 The Washington Post Company
Contact: http://mapinc.org/url/mUgeOPdZ
Website: http://www.washingtonpost.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/491
Author: Laura Vozzella

VA. HOUSE ALLOWS POT EXTRACTS FOR EPILEPSY

Bill Blocks Prosecution for Possession of Oils

Richmond - Parents of epileptic children gathered in the gallery of 
Virginia's law-and-order House of Delegates on Tuesday, almost afraid 
to look as their long-shot medical marijuana bill came up for a vote.

"I couldn't even look at the board," said Teresa Elder of 
Springfield, who considers two marijuana extracts a "last hope" for 
controlling seizures in her 22-year-old son, Tommy.

When she finally stole a glance at the lighted-up voting board, Elder 
was shocked to see only green.

The Republican-dominated chamber voted 98 to 0 for a bill intended to 
make it easier for Virginians with severe forms of epilepsy to use 
two oils derived from marijuana. Only two delegates opposed the bill, 
and they chose to abstain rather than to vote against it.

The overwhelming passage stunned Elder and other parents who never 
expected to succeed in Richmond's highly conservative lower chamber 
on their first try. The vote might be seen as a turning point for 
Virginia, which has staunchly opposed loosening marijuana laws as 
neighboring Maryland and the District have eased theirs. But 
legislators and activists on both sides of the marijuana issue 
cautioned against reading the House action as a sign that Virginia's 
conservative Republican Party is warming to more liberal marijuana policies.

The bill was written and rewritten in ways that betray the 
legislature's discomfort with the notion of liberalizing marijuana 
laws as much as its desire to help a particularly heart-rending group 
of patients and their families. House Republicans showed no interest 
in fixing the unworkable medical marijuana law it has on the books, 
much less signing off on recreational use, as has been done in 
Colorado. A Senate bill to decriminalize marijuana died in committee 
this session, as did a broader medical marijuana bill proposed in the House.

"It's a very narrow bill that is tailored to a very specific medical 
condition," said Bob Holsworth, a former Virginia Commonwealth 
University political scientist. "I think we're far from going down 
the path of becoming Rocky Mountain high."

One of the yes votes came from Del. C. Todd Gilbert (R-Shenandoah), 
who said the measure is "not even close to legalizing medical marijuana."

"It is a very small, narrowly targeted step to try to alleviate the 
suffering of these kids that does not open a Pandora's box with 
respect to the disaster that medical marijuana has represented in 
some states that have gone that route, specifically California," Gilbert said.

The legislation allows the use of two marijuana-extracted oils that 
lack the plant's intoxicating properties but help alleviate 
debilitating seizures. The bill provides a way for epileptics or 
their legal guardians to avoid prosecution for possession of 
cannabidiol oil (also known as CBD) and THC-A oil.

Similar bills have begun sweeping though legislatures - many of them 
in conservative states - after an August 2013 CNN documentary "Weed" 
that showed the plight of a family seeking the oil for their 
daughter's seizures, said Allen St. Pierre, executive director of the 
National Organization for the Reform of Marijuana Laws. About a dozen 
states have passed laws allowing use of the oils in the past 18 
months, including Alabama, Utah and Mississippi.

It's not quite the Age of Aquarius. More like "the CBD epoch," as 
staff at NORML refer to the phenomenon.

"In the course of one legislative session, some of the most 
conservative states have embraced this notion of CBD access," St. 
Pierre said. "We never could have predicted it, and we're currently 
vexed by it."

He worries that legislators are giving lip service to helping 
patients seeking medical marijuana by allowing limited forms to a 
very specific type of patient and providing no means of obtaining them.

"They're really being dragged there kicking and screaming by their 
constituents," St. Pierre said. "What we need to keep an eye out for 
is, brushing their hands, 'Look, we acted on medical marijuana. We did it.' "

The House bill, sponsored by Del. David B. Albo (R-Fairfax), heads to 
the Senate, which has passed similar legislation sponsored by Sen. 
David W. Marsden (D-Fairfax) with just one no vote. Democratic Gov. 
Terry McAuliffe supports the bills, spokesman Brian Coy has said.

Those big legislative wins came after considerable work to make the 
bills palatable to conservatives.

The process began with heart-wrenching stories that constituents 
brought to Albo and Marsden. Parents of children who suffered dozens 
of seizures a day, who had exhausted every conventional drug or 
suffered debilitating side-effects from them and who saw hope in 
little vials of oil derived from marijuana.

One mother moved to Colorado so her daughter could obtain the oils, 
leaving another daughter behind in Virginia until the strain on the 
family proved too much and they moved back. In front of legislators, 
a girl had a seizure during a committee hearing on the bill.

Albo and Marsden set about writing bills that would have not only 
permitted the use of the oils, but also would have established a way 
to provide it to patients. They had considered whether compounding 
pharmacies or state medical schools could produce it.

Albo said they ultimately concluded that they could not ask 
pharmacies or universities to produce something that remains illegal 
under federal law. The bills, as passed, do not address how patients 
will obtain the oils - a flaw in the eyes of critics on the left and 
right, who say that will force the use of products purchased on the 
black market whose quality will be uncertain.

Albo started out by trying to adjust the state's current medical 
marijuana statute. Virginia legalized medical marijuana in 1979 for 
patients with cancer and glaucoma, but that law requires "a valid 
prescription" - something doctors cannot legally provide as long as 
marijuana is federally restricted.

Albo's original bill added epilepsy to the list and changed "valid 
prescription" to "recommendation."

But the House committee taking up the bill was not willing to go that 
far. In the end, Albo and Marsden ended up with bills that apply only 
to patients with intractable epilepsy. And the bills would not 
legalize the oils but instead would provide an "affirmative defense" 
to anyone charged with possession of the oils.

Albo borrowed that approach from an issue that the conservative House 
holds near and dear: gun rights.

"It's almost the exact same language as the concealed-weapons 
statute," he said. "The concealed-weapons statute says, ' You cannot 
conceal these weapons, but if you can show you have a valid permit, 
then you can't be prosecuted for having these weapons.' We took that 
same theory and said, 'No one can have THC or CBD [oils], but if you 
have a written certification and you can show that to the court, the 
case would be dismissed.' "

Those changes raised the comfort level of GOP legislators wary of 
appearing soft on drugs, said one Republican insider, who spoke on 
the condition of anonymity to discuss a sensitive subject.

"We can't be painted as, ' Toke it up, brother,' " that person said.

Said Gilbert: "My knee-jerk reaction was absolutely that it was a 
veiled attempt to get us to medical marijuana or decriminalization. 
But nothing could be further from the truth."
- ---
MAP posted-by: Jay Bergstrom