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 Medical Marijuana

Written references to the use marijuana as a medicine date back nearly 5,000 years. Western medicine embraced marijuana's medical properties in the mid-1800s, and by the beginning of the 20th century, physicians had published more than 100 papers in the Western medical literature recommending its use for a variety of disorders. Cannabis remained in the United States pharmacopoeia until 1941, removed only after Congress passed the Marihuana Tax Act which severely hampered physicians from prescribing it. The American Medical Association (AMA) was one of the most vocal organizations to testify against the ban, arguing that it would deprive patients of a past, present and future medicine. It is now confined to Schedule I under the Controlled Substances Act as a drug that has a high potential for abuse, lacks an accepted medical use, and is unsafe for use under medical supervision. ( Shouldn't tobacco truly be  a Schedule I!!!)

Fourteen years after NORML's initial petition in 1986, the DEA finally held public hearings on the issue before an administrative law judge. Two years later, Judge Francis Young ruled that the therapeutic use of marijuana was recognized by a respected minority of the medical community, and that it met the standards of other legal medications. Young found: "Marijuana has been accepted as capable of relieving distress of great numbers of very ill people, and doing so with safety under medical supervision. It would be unreasonable, arbitrary and capricious for DEA to continue to stand between those sufferers and the benefits of this substance in light of the evidence in this record." Young recommended, "The Administrator transfer marijuana from Schedule I to Schedule II, to make it available as a legal medicine."

DEA Administrator John Lawn rejected Young's determination, choosing instead to invoke a differing set of criteria than those used by Judge Young. The Court of Appeals allowed Lawn's reversal to stand, effectively continuing the federal ban on the medical use of marijuana by seriously ill patients. It is urgent that state legislatures and the federal government act to correct this injustice.

There are more than 60 different cannabinoids; one of these, D9tetrahydrocannabinol (THC), is the most abundant and accounts for the intoxicating properties of cannabis. Other cannabinoids which occur in some abundance (e.g. cannabidiol and cannabinol) are not psychoactive, but it is thought that they may modify the effects of THC. The amounts and proportions of the various cannabinoids in each plant vary from strain to strain, and can be adjusted by breeding. By coincidence, the chemistry and pharmacology of cannabis were among the principal interests of the late Lord Todd, when he worked at Manchester University in the 1930s; he went on to become, among other things, the first Chairman of the House of Lords Select Committee on Science and Technology on its establishment in 1979.

THC and other cannabinoids dissolve readily in fat but not in water. This limits the possible formulations of cannabis and cannabinoid preparations, and slows down their absorption from the gut. On the other hand, when cannabis is smoked (in a "joint" or "reefer", or in a pipe), THC is absorbed very quickly into the bloodstream, through the large surface area of the pharynx and the lungs. After smoking, the psychoactive effects of THC are perceptible within seconds, and peak effects are achieved within minutes. When cannabis or cannabinoids are taken by mouth, peak effects may not occur for several hours, but they last longer.

Once THC has entered the bloodstream, it is widely distributed in the body, especially in fatty tissues. The slow release of THC from these tissues produces low levels of drug in the blood for several days after a single dose, but there is little evidence that any significant pharmacological effects persist for more than 4-6 hours after smoking or 6-8 after oral ingestion.

References:

-- In the Matter of Marihuana Rescheduling Petition, Docket 86-22 opinion, Recommended Ruling, Findings of Fact, Conclusions of Law, and Decision of Administrative Law Judge, September 6, 1988. Washington, DC: Drug Enforcement Agency; 1988.

-- Grinspoon L, Bakalar J. Marihuana, the Forbidden Medicine. New Haven, Conn Yale University Press, 1993. (pp133-136)

-- In the Matter of Marihuana Rescheduling Petition Docket 86-22, Affidavit of Daniel Dansac, M.D. Washington, DC: Drug Enforcement Agency; 1987.

-- Doblin R, Kleiman MAR. Marihuana as anti-emetic medicine; a survey of oncologists' attitudes and experiences. J Clin Oncol. 1991;9:1276-1290.

-- The National Academy of Sciences report, "Marijuana and Health" (National Academy Press, 1982), remains the most useful overview of the health effects of marijuana, its major conclusions remaining largely unaffected by the last 10 years of research.

-- Lovinger and Jones, The Marihuana Question (Dodd, Mead & Co., NY 1985), is the most exhaustive and fair-handed summary of the evidence against marijuana.

-- Good, positive perspectives may be found in Lester Grinspoon's Marihuana, the Forbidden Medicine (Yale Press, 1993) and Marihuana Reconsidered (Harvard U. Press 1971), which debunks many of the older anti-pot myths.

-- Leo Hollister, "Health Aspects of Cannabis," Pharmacological Reviews 38:1-20 (1986).

Visit : Schaffer's Drug Library - FCDA - ProCon.org - UKCIA - NORML - THCF - Rx Marijuana

~Medical Marijuana States~

We recognize the possibility that not all medical marijuana users register for identification cards and not all of the people registered have valid medical uses for the marijuana. The chart below shows both the actual number of patients holding identification cards in the nine states with mandatory registration and the estimated number of patients (according to MPP, the Marijuana Policy Project) for the three states (CA, OR, and WA) with voluntary or no registration.

State population numbers are from the US Census Bureau's 2006 data. Unless otherwise noted, the chart reflects the information from each state's official registry website that was available as of Jan. 14, 2009.

State Medical marijuana patients State population # of patients per 1,000 state residents 1. Alaska 175 670,053 0.26 2. California 202,4161 36,457,549 5.55 3. Colorado 4,515 4,753,377 0.95 4. Hawaii 3,240 1,285,498 2.52 5. Maine 2272 1,321,574 0.17 6. Michigan                 ?      10,095,643                 ? 7. Montana 1,144 944,632 1.21 8. Nevada 860 2,495,529 0.35 9. New Mexico 162 1,954,599 0.08 10. Oregon 20,547 3,700,758 5.55 11. Rhode Island 517 1,067,610 0.48 12. Vermont 107 623,908 0.17 13. Washington 35,5103 6,395,885 5.55 Total: 269,420 Average: 1.90  United States 577,7124 304,058,724 1.90 1. California has voluntary registration (as opposed to mandatory registration in all other legal medical marijuana states besides Washington and Maine), so we used the estimate made by the Marijuana Policy Project (MPP), which is based on Oregon's per capita number of 5.55 medical marijuana patients per 1,000 state residents. The number of voluntarily registered users in California was 27,023 as of Feb. 6, 2009 according to the state's medical marijuana program website. 2. Maine does not have a registration program. 227 is an estimate by MPP based on Vermont's per capita of 0.17 medical marijuana patients per 1,000 state residents. 3. Washington does not have a registration program. 35,510 is an estimate by MPP based on Oregon's per capita number of 5.55 medical marijuana patients per 1,000 state residents. 4. If the average number of medical marijuana patients per 1,000 residents in states with legal medical marijuana is extrapolated to all 50 states (population 304,058,724 as of 2008, according to the US Census Bureau), then the total number of medical marijuana users as of Feb. 9, 2009 would theoretically be 577,712.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

• Medical Cannabis State Laws
  

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THC is NOT Cannabis!

~The Report~

To equate with cannabis, the natural plant, findings of research into a laboratory synthesised or isolated, concentrated chemical compound, such as THC (tetrahydro-cannabinol), is erroneous, technically impertinent and profoundly misleading. Properties of compounds are unique, and are not a sum of properties of the individual elements compounds from which they are made. In science of chemistry, the properties of substances, elemental and compound, are seen to alter, and are affected by interation and combination. Simply, by the binding of atoms and molecules, one "thing" can and dose become quite another. **Hydrogen compounded into water is safer to consume, hydrogen extracted from water boils at room temperature and is fatal to humans if consumed. Similarly, THC in combination with other elements and compounds within the natural plant is 'different' from the THC isolated and concentrated.

There are over 66+ different know cannabinoid compounds. In addition to unique characteristics, plants have a wide variety of vegatative matter in common. Cannabis totals over 1000 different known substances, which all combine to make but ONE  unique substance---thats is cannabis herb, which have evolved in nature a benign and health-inhancing character of inestimable value to the health and well-being of humans...when they can obtain it...

The total difference between cannabis and THC is demostrated by the fact that on its own, THC is a toxic substance causing negative, potentially fatal reactions in laboratory animals. This is utterly different from herbal cannabis which is non-toxic and is incapable of causing fatality in humans and animals at any does!

The completeness of the difference between THC and the cannabis plant is also well by the fact that cannabis, the natural herb, so efficacious in preventions of glaucoma blindness, relases intra-ocular pressure (IOP) by 30%. After THC is estracted from it, the remaining herb lower IOP by 10%; but THC, after approximentely seven days' use during which fluctuating marginal effects are recorded, THC does not reduce IOP at all!

Official empirical clinical test confirm (i.e. they are replicable) that smoking of natural herb cannabis produces no effect on or marginal improvements to: mental concentration, ablities and co-ordinative skills, use of machinery, driving a car, test of memory (chort or long-term), concept formation, mential adroitness. By contrast, doses of isolated pharmaceutical -THC causes impairments to test subjects's performance, with nausea, umpleasant mental effects and headaches.

Sense the naturally produced plant is not patentable and illegal. Nabilone, Marinol, etc., the tablet and capsule attemps to gain a patented, profitable windfall, are a well-known failure. These troches contain lab-synthesised or extracted THC, refined to 90%+ concentrates, laboratory-processed THC products have been trial-tesed since the 1940's. Contrary to the publicised claims of those with vested interests, far from containing or embodying the "active ingredients" of cannabis, THC is useless when compared to the herb itself.

This prohibition was intended to provide Owners with monopoly; the method by which populations sufferwhile all the money from permitted trading accures into the hands of a very few preferred people and the state.

References:

-- Medical Data, US DEA, Aministrative Law Judicial investigations.

-- Ibid.; also: Hepler & Frank, UCLA Coll. of Med Ref. sections on glaucoma, & Elvy Musikka, in Part Three.

-- Medical Data, US DEA, Admin. Law Judicial investigations; ref. Part Four.

10 Things Every Parent, Teenager & Teacher Should Know About: Marijuana (Cannabis)

Medical Marijuana Strain Guide ; is something many people have little or no knowledge of, the different strains with similar but, differentiating effects. Besides the gorgeous variety in the looks of this plant, there is much more happening at the molecular level.