Medical Marijuana is a Farce

BY JOE LENOFF

On November 4, my home state of Florida voted on the legal permissibility of medical marijuana. It failed, but it is still significant that Florida voters went to the polls to decide whether the state would become the 24^th in the country to approve medical marijuana. Medical marijuana is a nonsensical term used to support nonsensical policies. There is not enough scientific research surrounding the effects of marijuana, especially with the effects of delta 8 thc gummies, and even if there were, legally recognizing marijuana’s medicinal use and not its recreational use ignores the vast majority of marijuana users.

Under the Controlled Substances Act (CSA) of 1970, marijuana is considered a Schedule I substance, the most rigorously regulated scheduling classification. As a result, according to federal law, marijuana has “no currently accepted medical use in treatment and can only be used in very limited circumstances.” As such, research is extremely limited. The National Institute on Drug Abuse (NIDA), a branch of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, administers marijuana cultivation and research in the United States. In theory, the NIDA offers contracts every five years to interested researchers. Since the NIDA’s inception in 1974, though, it has only given a contract to the University of Mississippi. Dr. Mahmoud ElSohly oversees the project, and he explains his role as such: “The federal government is the only agency, the only institution, that has the right to distribute marijuana. We are not doing it as the University of Mississippi. We are doing it as a contractor for the government to carry on that activity. So, the main purpose of that project is to prepare, cultivate, standardize, manicure, and make standardized marijuana for research.” Standardization is critical for scientific research, and the federal government should be applauded for seeking the highest standards in federal research. However, quantity and diversity are also crucial to research. As Dr. J. Michael Bostwick of the Mayo Clinic has pointed out, the NIDA has “historically focused its efforts (almost) exclusively on demonstrating the drug’s harmful effects.” Thus, research is limited to a small number of studies, and the researchers themselves are predisposed to assume marijuana is harmful. Dr. ElSohly himself said, “I feel sorry for Colorado and Washington state [for legalizing marijuana]. In a few years, you are really going to see the impact of the liberal laws they have there.”

If science is understood as a constantly challenged or supported set of hypotheses and theories, then the evidence cited offering marijuana’s threat or lack of safety are rendered moot by both their lack of breadth and their inherent bias. The Drug Enforcement Agency (DEA) claims that marijuana has no “accepted medicinal value,” and they are correct, but only because the research is so skewed.

Of course, prior to the CSA, there was very little scientific testing of marijuana, yet the federal government determined that marijuana must be heavily regulated. Now, because of its heavy regulation, only insufficient research can be conducted to determine if marijuana needs less regulation. Essentially, it seems that federal law states, “We assume marijuana is highly dangerous, so we must restrict access, even to scientific studies. Also, because there have been no studies, we can only maintain our assumption of marijuana’s danger.”

Now, let’s say for the sake of argument that scientists have synthesized the medicinally active components of marijuana perfectly, causing no side effects, pleasant or otherwise, and that new substance was enshrined as a fully legal drug by the FDA, DEA, and all relevant federal institutions. Would marijuana advocates be pleased? The many suffering people in the United States using marijuana as medicine to regain their appetite in the battle against cancer or to alleviate the pressure of glaucoma would perhaps be pleased. Today, smoking marijuana is one of the most efficient methods of delivery, so under this scenario those patients may be pleased they no longer have to smoke their medicine and receive the (arguably pleasant) side effects. However, the legitimately suffering are the vast minority of marijuana users. Most people smoke marijuana recreationally. Pew reports that 12 percent of the general American population has smoked marijuana in the past year, and that 27 percent of people under thirty have. If we take those numbers at their face value (and they are certainly low estimates) it is obvious that either we have a silent public health crisis, or that there is more to marijuana than medicinal value. Whether or not “medical” marijuana is legal will not matter for most users. Law regulating use should reflect actual use. States or the federal government should not have to justify a largely recreational substance based on its medicinal value.

I begrudgingly (and unsuccessfully) voted “yes” on Florida Amendment 2, but in so doing I was perpetuating the farce that marijuana should be enshrined in law as medicine. Both the research and the categorization are insufficient.