Cannabis Study House - NORML Weekly News in Audio 2008.5.8

Weekly News in Audio

May 8, 2008

"Radical" Russ Belville
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United Kingdom: Parliament To Vote On Enacting Stiffer Pot Penalties -- Prime Minister Gordon Brown Calls Cannabis “Lethal;” Urges Parliament To “Send A Message”

Inhaled Cannabis Reduces Central And Peripheral Neuropathic Pain, Study Says

Massachusetts: Legal Challenge Argues State Pot Laws Are Unconstitutional

London, United Kingdom:
United Kingdom: Parliament To Vote On Enacting Stiffer Pot Penalties -- Prime Minister Gordon Brown Calls Cannabis “Lethal;” Urges Parliament To “Send A Message”

Home Secretary Jacqui Smith announced plans this week to reclassify cannabis as a Class B drug under British law. If the change is approved by Parliament, it would increase the penalties for minor pot possession from a verbal warning (under current policy) to up to five years in jail.

Smith’s recommendation contradicts the findings of Britain’s Advisory Panel on the Misuse of Drugs, which issued a report this week calling for cannabis to remain classified as a Class C ‘soft’ drug. The panel determined that pot lacks the health risks of other Class B drugs such as amphetamines and barbiturates, and concluded that use of the drug is unlikely to cause mental illnesses such as schizophrenia.

"The evidence for the existence of an association between frequency of cannabis use and the development of psychosis is, on the available evidence, weak," the Panel found. "The council does not advise the reclassification of cannabis products to Class B; it recommends they remain within Class C."

It is the third time in six years the Advisory Panel has recommended to Parliament that cannabis be classified as a Class C drug, a category that includes anabolic steroids and Valium.

Since taking office last June, Prime Minister Gordon Brown (Labour) has consistently pushed for increasing British pot penalties, claiming that marijuana’s use can be fatal. "[T]he cannabis on the streets is now of a lethal quality and we really have got to send out a message to young people," Brown stated last week. "[T]his is not acceptable."

Parliament downgraded cannabis possession to a non-arrestable offense in 2004. Since then, marijuana use by young people age 16 to 24 has fallen approximately 20 percent. According the statistics published by the British Home Office last year, only eight percent of Britons now report using cannabis, the lowest percentage ever recorded by the agency.

Home Office statistics also indicate that police seizures of cannabis have increased since 2004, though the total number of Britons arrested for pot-related violations has fallen.

A spokesperson for the Association of Police Officers told the UK Guardian newspaper that police would continue to issue verbal warnings to most minor pot offenders 窶� regardless of whether Parliament eventually reclassifies cannabis.

For more information, please contact Allen St. Pierre, NORML Executive Director, at (202) 483-5500, or Paul Armentano, NORML Deputy Director, at: paul@norml.org.

Davis, CA:
Inhaled Cannabis Reduces Central And Peripheral Neuropathic Pain, Study Says

Cannabis significantly reduces neuropathic pain compared to placebo and is well tolerated by patients with chronic pain conditions, according to clinical trial data to be published in The Journal of Pain.

Investigators at the University of California at Davis, in conjunction with the University of California Center for Medical Cannabis Research (CMCR), assessed the efficacy of inhaled cannabis on pain intensity among 38 patients with central and/or peripheral neuropathic pain in a randomized, placebo-controlled, crossover trial. Researchers reported that smoking low-grade (3.5 percent THC) and mid-grade (7 percent THC) cannabis equally reduced patients’ perception of spontaneous pain.

"[A] significant … reduction in [a 100-point visual analog scale of] pain intensity per minute was noted from both 3.5 percent and 7 percent cannabis compared to placebo," authors wrote. "Separate appraisals using the patient global score and multidimensional [eleven-point neuropathic pain scale also] revealed that both active agents alleviated pain compared with placebo."

Investigators added: "[N]o participant withdrew because of tolerability issues. Subjects receiving active agent endorsed a ‘good drug effect’ more than a ‘bad drug effect.’"

They concluded: "In the present experiment, cannabis reduced pain intensity and unpleasantness equally. Thus, as with opioids, cannabis does not rely on a relaxing or tranquilizing effect, but rather reduces both the core component of nociception (nerve pain) and the emotional aspect of the pain experience to an equal degree."

The study is the second clinical trial conducted by CMCR investigators to conclude that inhaled cannabis significantly reduces chronic neuropathy, a condition that is typically unresponsive to both opioids and non-steroidal anti-inflammatory drugs such as ibuprofen.

Commenting on the study’s the findings, NORML Deputy Director Paul Armentano said: "With the results of each published study it becomes increasingly apparent why the US government has tried consistently to stonewall clinical research on the therapeutic effects of inhaled cannabis. Each new trial the Feds approve provides additional evidence undermining the government’s ‘flat Earth’ position that cannabis is without medical value."

For more information, please contact Paul Armentano, NORML Deputy Director, at: paul@norml.org.
Full text of the study, "A randomized, placebo-controlled, crossover trial of cannabis cigarettes in neuropathic pain," will appear in the Journal of Pain.

Boston, MA:
Massachusetts: Legal Challenge Argues State Pot Laws Are Unconstitutional

A Boston judge will rule on Monday whether to allow evidence to be presented at a pre-trial hearing regarding the constitutionality of the state’s marijuana prohibition laws. The legal challenge, launched by NORML Legal Counsel Keith Stroup and High Times Magazine Associate Publisher Rick Cusick, argues that scientific and epidemiological evidence affirming the relative safety of marijuana does not support a criminal ban on the drug’s possession and use.

Stroup and Cusick, who are expected to acknowledge at trial that they were sharing a joint when arrested at the 2007 Boston Freedom Rally, are prepared to call numerous experts 窶� including Dr. Lester Grinspoon (Harvard Medical School), Richard Bonnie, Esq. (University of Virginia Law School), Dr. Jeffrey Miron (Harvard University), and Dr. Keith Saunders (Northeastern University) 窶� if their request for an evidentiary hearing is granted.

The defendants and their counsel will appear at trial in Boston Municipal Court, courtroom #10, at 9:00AM Monday, May 12.

For more information, please contact Keith Stroup, NORML Legal Counsel, at (202) 483-5500, keith@norml.org
or visit: http://www.norml.org/index.cfm?Group_ID=7494.

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