The U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) has allowed the growing and distribution of marijuana for the purposes of research.
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Meanwhile, according to commentators, marijuana being a Schedule I substance (meaning that by definition it had “no now accepted medical use and a high potential for abuse”), there were significant hurdles to in the way of its use for research.
Hillary Rodham Clinton’s campaign has revealed that if she is elected president, she would re-schedule marijuana from a schedule I substance to a schedule II substance. However, marijuana use is still considered an offense under Federal law.
Reading the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration’s report on marijuana, on how it should remain one of the nation’s most risky drugs and has no medical value, we can’t help but wonder what rock the agency’s leaders have been living under. Substances in Schedule 1 are determined by the Food and Drug Administration to have no medical use.
The Obama administration’s position on marijuana started to ease in earnest in 2013 when the Justice Department notified Colorado and Washington, the first two states to legalize pot for recreational use and sales, that it would not interfere with state laws so long as the drug was kept out of the hands of children, off the black market and away from federal property.
“This decision isn’t based on danger”.
Question – What does the DEA announcement mean for the future of marijuana? At a National Institutes of Health conference in March, researchers presented studies that showed – studies conducted even with the federal restrictions – that cannabinoids, the chemical compounds in marijuana, can help symptoms of epilepsy, multiple sclerosis, post-traumatic stress disorder and can help manage pain.
Q – What other drugs are in the same category?
Right now, all marijuana available for research purposes in the United States is grown at the University of Mississippi. “If the scientific understanding of marijuana changes-and it could change-then the decision could change”, he wrote.
Federal enforcement of marijuana laws now relies on an August 2013 memo from Deputy Attorney General James M. Cole, which said that in states that have legalized marijuana for medical or recreational purposes, the federal government should make stopping it a priority only when there are exacerbating circumstances, such as distribution to minors, control by criminal syndicates, or diversion to other states.
Twenty-five states and the District of Columbia have legalized weed for medical use, starting with California way back in 1996. Medical marijuana has been legal in Nevada since 2000, but the first dispensaries didn’t open until 2015, a decade and a half later.
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Montana voters will consider a measure to restore the state’s medical marijuana law after legislative and judicial measures topped them earlier.
