Associated Press
Marijuana Industry News March 8, 2013
Ex-DEA Officials Pressure White House to Go After New Recreational Marijuana States…
As we have previously reported at Marijuana.net, federal authorities have remained relatively quiet on the issue of legal marijuana ever since the voters of Colorado and Washington state decided to legalize recreational use. The issue is gaining national acceptance as a recent Reason/Rupe poll suggested that 72% of Americans do not think marijuana users should be arrested. The poll also found that 68% of respondents do not feel growers should be arrested. Fifty three percent of those included in the national poll said they felt marijuana should be regulated in a similar fashion to alcohol. Even with swelling public support, former DEA officials are trying to convince the federal government to overpower Colorado and Washington. The retired DEA members feel that if the feds do not act now, they may lose the issue forever. Peter Bensinger, a former DEA administrator recently told the Associated Press that “My fear is that the Justice Department will do what they are doing now: Do nothing and say nothing. If they don’t act now, these laws will be fully implemented in a matter of months.” In a country where consensus is becoming a rare phenomenon, these soaring levels of support may already have signaled the point of no return. As we start to feel the impact of sequestration and lack of compromise, DEA officials may find it a tough sell to continue using tax dollars to go after marijuana users and growers. Additionally, federal law is actually preventing billions in potential tax revenue that is desperately needed.
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New Jersey Lawmakers Seeking to Keep Medical Marijuana Patients on Organ Transplant List…
Many lawmakers around the United States have long snickered at medical marijuana. The easy and quick analysis is that it MUST be front a for those looking to circumvent the law. However, for many this is the most serious issue they have ever encountered in their life. As millions worldwide have improved their quality of life with medical marijuana use, naïve talking point politicians have been slow to research the issue. One major problem for elderly medical marijuana patients is that they typically taken off organ recipient lists. This places them in a difficult situation. How does one value the long term (needed organ transplant) over the short term (immediate daily pain relieved by cannabis)? New Jersey is attempting to fix this before it becomes a major issue in the Garden State. Earlier this week, New Jersey’s Senate Health, Human Services and Senior Citizens Committee passed S-1220. The panel stated that S-1220 “would provide that a registered, qualifying patient’s authorized use of medical marijuana would be considered equivalent to using other prescribed medication rather than an illicit substance and therefore would not disqualify the person from needed medical care, such as an organ transplant.” It took New Jersey several years to cut through their bureaucratic red tape and institute a medical marijuana program passed under previous Governor, Jim Corzine. However, it is reassuring to see that they are taking a compassionate approach with this issue. In a press release by the bill’s co-sponsors, lawmakers said that removing patients from the organ recipient list because of medical marijuana use is a practice that is “unconscionable as the patients have followed their doctors’ orders and have taken a legal medication to reduce the pain and suffering associated with their illness. Transplant centers should not be able to discriminate against people for using this prescription pain killer.”
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Michigan Judge Rules that Medical Marijuana Patients Cannot be Denied Unemployment Benefits…
The story above highlighted a victory for patients in New Jersey. We also have good news to report for those patients in Michigan. Last August, a Michigan court ruled that the Michigan Marijuana Act of 2008 “does not offer any employment protection to card holders” and “does not regulate private employment.” In September the decision was upheld when former Walmart employee, Joseph Casias, was let go for marijuana use even as he was suffering from an inoperable brain tumor. He was also denied benefits after being let go. This week, Ingham County Circuit Judge William Collette ruled that medical marijuana patients can receive unemployment benefits after termination of employment. Medical marijuana has had a wild ride in Michigan over the course of the past several years since it was legalized in 2008. Even as Michigan lawmakers and state Attorney General, Bill Schuette, try to fight against medical marijuana, residents have made it clear they support a patient’s right to use medical cannabis. Michigan has some of the most progressive medical marijuana laws and is one of the only states that allows for minors to receive legal marijuana for certain qualifying conditions.
Teen Marijuana use on the Rise: Is America Finally Ready to Discuss Regulation?
Whether they realize it or not, the American minor is one of the staples of politics in the United States. Both sides of an out of touch political aisle hold up our children and claim to know how policies will or will not impact them. For the largest group of Americans who cannot vote, children have an awful lot to do with governing policy in the United States.
Marijuana advocates and patients are accustomed to this. The excuse of “what about the message this sends to children” has caused a tremendous amount of pain for patients who have witnessed their safe access be compromised as a result. Sick patients typically are not wearing trench coats and selling drugs on the street, rather, they are just seeking relief. Patients would say the message to children should be “we do not sit idle in this country and watch people suffer when we can easily help them.” Talking to your children about why people medicate is a far easier approach. Marijuana simply having legal status does not put it teen hands. Like alcohol, (with far worse addicting qualities yet receives less criticism), there are safety precautions to make sure minors/non patients are not purchasing it. Direct conversation is always the best antidote, but just as television executives have found, parents do not want to be the bad guys and have tried to enlist the help of policy makers to make their lives easier.
Reports on rising teenage marijuana use have been making the media rounds lately. According to an article by the Associated Press that was posted on CBS News, monthly marijuana use by teens rose from 19% in 2008 to 27% currently. The article cites a study conducted by the Partnership at Drugfree.org. Additional findings included a rise in teenagers who smoke 20 or more times per month. In 2008 this number was at 5%, but has almost doubled to 9% in 2012. Morgan Fox, a spokesman for Marijuana Policy Project responded to the findings by saying “If we remove marijuana from the criminal market and have the market run by responsible business people that have an incentive to check IDs and not sell to minors, then we might see those rates drop again.”
The facts obviously shows that legalized marijuana is not the core of the issue as even in states where marijuana is not legal, teens have been resourceful enough to find cannabis. Our attack on marijuana for close to a century has created a black market, The Mexican Cartel, dangerous synthetics, and gross misinformation. Ridiculous propaganda that was easily proven false by the last 50 years of youth has only made opponents seem silly and created an even larger generational gap. If a rise in teen cannabis smoking truly is a concern, then regulation is the only way to keep it out of the hands of minors.
New Prescription Painkiller stated to become Ten Occasions More Effective than Vicotin
America’s growing prescription abuse problem continues to be well recorded. With major news shops for example CNN confirming spikes in infants being born hooked on prescription medications, or Fox News confirming more people die every year from prescription drugs than heroin and cocaine combined, you might assume the Food and drug administration could be thinking about a moratorium on approving more recent and much more potent pills.
Obviously this kind of assumption wouldn’t be consistent with recent reviews that describe the brand new drug Zohydro, that is presently getting used in clinical tests. Zohydro, to be precise, may be the title provided to the drug through the North Park based company Zogenix. Three others (Purdue Pharma, Cephalon, and Egalet) also provide began clinical tests while using potent pure type of hydrocodone but appear to become farther from reaching the marketplace. Based on reviews, Zohydro is 10 occasions as strong as Vicodin, which already costs the American public over 484 billion dollars yearly because of health care costs, incarceration and traffic accidents.
Using the prescription abuse cases already rising by 430% throughout the final 10 years, an herbal viagra with the strength of Zohydro is frightening many experts. The leader from the National Coalition Against Prescription Substance Abuse, April Rovero, told the Connected Press that “”I’ve got a large concern that this may be the following OxyContin” and “We simply have no need for this available on the market.Inch Information provided through the Drug Enforcement Administration established that appointments with the er because of hydrocodone use skyrocketed from 19,221 in 2000 to 86,258 in ’09. This really is clearly before Zohydro hits the marketplace, which will be the first drug to make use of hydrocodone in the pure and many potent form. Hydrocodone is part of the opiate family including methadone, heroin, morphine and oxycodone.
News of Zohydro is baffling for a lot of advocates of medicinal marijuana. Certainly the chance of prescription narcotic abuse is much more than well-established but patients have to legally depend on very potentially addictive substances. Medical cannabis advocates could be skeptical why this type of product could be available. Although people for example Karsten Lindhardt, leader of Egalet, believe that hydrocodone is essential for doctors, most are questioning such motives. The Denmark based Egalet is presently testing their very own pure hydrocodone product. Lindhardt stated “Sometimes you circulate someone between various opioids, plus some could have a better effect than the others,Inch while Jackson, co-founding father of Advocates for that Reform of Prescription Opioids feels “The entire supply-side system is to establish to perpetuate this massive unloading of opioid drugs around the American public.” The thought of circulating opium based items, as Lindhardt indicates, might not sit well with lots of patients.
 
Marijuana.internet will give you ongoing updates on the introduction of the hydrocodone items.
Not Too Fast! Nederlander Break The Rules Prohibit on Marijuana for Vacationers
Its individuals people whose excitement was cleaned away with devastation in the news from the approaching Nederlander marijuana tourist prohibit, don’t unpack your bags at this time. The planned attack around the popular tourist friendly coffee houses continues to be formally pressed back until 2013.
The Connected Press reported that Justice Minister Ivo Opstelten established that the delay was because of “practical difficulties.” Clearly this explanation leaves the way forward for the prohibit open ended. Captured, it had been introduced the Netherlands could be banning vacationers from acquiring marijuana. Rather, a people only program for grown ups over 18 could be solely open to Nederlander citizens. Formally marijuana is against the law within the Netherlands, however clients are allowed to buy as much as five grams within the coffee houses.
The timing and insufficient an thorough explanation will probably belong to scrutiny by experts. Many have forecasted terrible economic systems allowing this to continue holland when they were to create a move that will endanger their thriving tourist economy. Actually, recently the financial news had been harmful to the Nederlander economy as media shops reported the economy had been slowing down and may possibly face contraction in approaching quarters. It was only some of the concern as numerous citizens concerned about re-opening the underground community for marijuana. If vacationers still came, are they going to be seeking marijuana from street suppliers instead of a controlled setting? Nederlander politics have moved more toward the best recently, however the suggested attack from the marijuana industry was still being shocking to a lot of.
Possibly experts have developed some fear in Nederlander political figures. To create this type of move as the economy has already been battling could cause unemployment for a lot of chosen authorities if financial conditions would deteriorate further. Furthermore, the move leaves Nederlander leaders open for other critique. Tobacco enforcement is becoming more poor within the Netherlands, unlike the relaxation around the globe. This past year the Nederlander government allowed some bars to be exempt from following certain smoking limitations. Based on the Connected Press 27% of Nederlander citizens smoke tobacco items, that is a greater rate than Britain or even the U . s . States. This relaxed posture toward tobacco would water lower any arguments that health is the first concern. A delay within the marijuana prohibit may provide sufficient thinking here we are at political figures to ponder if they would like to take their economy, jobs, and safety in danger. When the prohibit continues to be to occur eventually, next year’s High Occasions Cannabis Cup may be the final in Amsterdam. Tourist money produced in the event might have a fascinating method of forcing Nederlander political figures to re-think their positions.