THE WEED BUSINESS

Our friends at Firedoglake are petitioning the FDA to reschedule marijuana from a drug with “no medical benefit” to a drug that has acceptable medical uses. This tactic would eliminate the need for medipot states to come up with creative ways for doctors to give the go ahead to their patients who could benefit from medicinal marijuana. Currently, doctors can’t actually prescribe marijuana (because the FDA says it has no benefit); instead, they can only “recommend” certain patients use the drug. As it stands now, each medipot state has its own rules governing the sale of marijuana to needy patients.

Firedoglake and its subsidiary, JustSayNow, want to get state governors and legislators to pressure the FDA to reschedule marijuana. In order to get your governor to put pressure on the Feds, you (yes, YOU, too) need to put pressure on your governor and representatives. The first basic step to take is to add your name to the following petition:

http://action.firedoglake.com/page/s/reschedule-mmj

Although we all know the obvious benefits that would occur in the realms of healthcare and economics (state tax revenues increase, drug enforcement costs decline), this is going to be a tough fight.

Because marijuana is a naturally occurring drug that patients can grow themselves, the FDA, which is heavily influenced by the giants of the pharmaceutical industry, will not be easy to convince. When they do agree to budge on this issue, it will probably be to approve a compound derived from marijuana like THC that a drug company wants to market as relieving nausea in chemotherapy patients. We can’t be satisfied with that outcome because such a drug would likely cost much more and work no better than medical marijuana does currently. Therefore, they would have to give full approval to the entire whole foods version of cannabis on humanitarian grounds.

I rest my case.

The fact was realized in Michigan that marijuana is an essential element in the treatment of many chronic diseases and illnesses; so it’s legal cultivation and distribution was taken into consideration. On November 4th 2008, through a referendum it was decided to allow qualified patients to legally possess, cultivate and use medical marijuana. The related law was passed on December 4th 2008 and was named as “Michigan Medical Marijuana Act”.

The said, the act has a principal defect that it doesn’t specifically deal with matters relating to marijuana dispensaries. The law confirms that specific patients can possess, grow and use medical marijuana but doesn’t layout any system about how to acquire medical marijuana, seeds or plants- where as the laws of other states do address this issue.

The limitations of this act can be pointed out as:

It doesn’t specify say how marijuana can be obtained for medical purposes.
It doesn’t specify say how marijuana can be dispensed.

This program is supervised by the Michigan department of health. The MDCH issues identification cards for the patients or their registered caregivers who are legally permitted to grow marijuana for patients. This program doesn’t allow doctors to prescribe marijuana as a medicine. The doctors can only certify that the mentioned person suffers from the illness that needs to be treated by the marijuana. The Act actually lays out a system in which specific patients or their registered caregivers use of medical marijuana are allowed a limited quantity only for personal use and in a locked facility.

The Michigan Dispensary Laws seem to be very much like California’s were several years ago until SB420 was passed. SB420 realized the formation of collectives that could dispense medication within a closed circuit model- meaning that medicine could only be acquired and dispensed to members of the collective.

The MMMA provides for a system of designated caregivers. The caregiver can acquire 2.5 ounces of usable marijuana and grow up to 12 marijuana plants for a qualifying patient. The caregiver may assist up to 5 patients. The caregiver must sign a statement agreeing to provide marijuana only to the qualifying patients who have named the individual as their caregiver.

The caregiver’s name, address, birth date and social security number must be provided to the state at the time of a patient’s registration. The Department will issue a registry identification card to the caregiver who is named by a qualifying patient on his/her application. The Department may not issue a registry identification card to a proposed caregiver who has previously been convicted of a felony drug offense. The Department will verify through a background check with the Michigan State Police that the designated caregiver has no disqualifying felony drug conviction. A caregiver may receive reasonable compensation for services provided to assist with a qualifying patient’s medical use of marijuana.

republished with permission from Start-a-dispensary.com