Iowa Pharmacy Board open their eyes and ears to the benefits of marijuana,
In early June the Iowa State Pharmacy Board stated that marijuana has no medical benefits. Susan Frey, who chairs the state pharmacy board said there is no truth to marijuana having any medicinal benefits.
Now the Iowa Pharmacy board has relented by announcing a series of public hearings on whether or not marijuana is a schedule 1 drug.Schedule 1 drugs are defined as deadly addictive and with no accepted medical use. For more information follow the Google link or see Iowa’s Quad City Times new article. Iowa is home to one of the federal medical marijuana patients receiving a tin of 300 marijuana joints every month.The federally provided cannabis is handled via the pharmacy network, so it will be very interesting to see what the Iowa Board of Pharmacy says after the hearings.The first hearing is scheduled for August 19th.
The history of cannabis (AKA Marijuana) is rife with medical applications dating from ancient China to the United States prior to the 1937 marijuana prohibition laws. See "The Antique Cannabis book" about about pre-1937 medical cannabis products. It is good to hear that Iowa is open to hearing some of the evidence versus making a silly statement like "there is no truth to marijuana having any medicinal benefits."
On Wednesday December 2, 2009 was an historic day here in Pennsylvania. For the first time ever, the House of Representatives held a hearing of the Health and Human Services Committee in order to hear testimony on HB 1393, the Compassionate Use Medical Marijuana Act. You can read my testimony online in PDF format. Thanks to the dozens of patients and advocates who traveled to Harrisburg for the hearing, wrote testimony, or simply spread the word, we had a resounding success educating the HHS committee how marijuana is medicine but jail is not.
Dim lights
22 Members of the HHS Committee heard testimony from a variety of advocates, patients, and physicians. Advocates who testified in favor of the bill included PA Rep. Mark Cohen, Chris Goldstein and Derek Rosenzweig of PhillyNORML and Pennsylvanians for Medical Marijuana (PA4MMJ), Edward Pane of PA4MMJ, Patrick K. Nightingale Esq. of Pittsburgh NORML and PA4MMJ; Bradley Walter, Charles Rocha, Sandra Crue, John Ray Wilson, and Dr. Denis Petro; Rabbi Eric Cytryn, Brian Gralnik, former Montgomery County Commissioner Ruth Damsker, and Dr. Howard Swidler, MD, Chief of Emergency Medicine at Warren Hospital, all from the Jewish Social Policy Action Network (JSPAN); and Bob Cappecchi of the Marijuana Policy Project (MPP).
What's Next?
Medical Marijuana was well represented at this hearing, so well that both chairmen of the committee - Reps. Oliver (D) and Baker (R) - have agreed that more hearings need to be held.
Rep. Benninghoff (R), Rep. Beyer (R), Rep. Seip (D), and Rep. Payton (D) asked very good questions, indicated they are leaning towards supporting the bill, or flat out refuted the opposition during the hearing. It is imperative that we get at least two Republicans as co-sponsors if this bill is to have a chance in the full House of Rep, and gain any traction in the Senate later this year. Current legislators' known positions can be found at Philly Norml Website.
