To
my citesANTI-medicinal cannabis
Wev Shea division of elections pamphlet for 1998 November election
Marijuana is a debilitating illegal Drug. In 1990 the Citizen of Alaska voted to "recrimanalize" the use of marijuana. Now, at a time when illegal drug use is destroying the very foundation of our Nation and this great state -the family unit- This Act is attempting to legalize marijuana as a "medicine."
This inept Act allows the "patients" and primary "care-givers" to grow their own "pot" The Act has no provisions to protect against the impurities from "street grass." The Act then attempts to hold patients and care-givers, as well as physicians "harmless" from the Use of marijuana. The Act is a license to grow, use, transport and sell marijuana. It is a bad law.
Dronabinol (marinol) is an approved, controlled drug that is the principal "psychoactive" substance in marijuana Physicians prescribe Dronabinol for symptoms ranging from nausea associated with cancer chemo therapy, to anorexia in AIDS patients. Due to the "psychoactive" affects of Dronabinol, patient supervision, if possible in an in patient setting is required. Marijuana is no substitute.
The Legalizing of street-grade marijuana, grown by its drug-user patients and care-givers, as allowed by this Act borders on "pure folly." What physician would prescribe an illegal drug to patients when there are no quality controls? No physician can ignore a basic tenant of medical practice: "quality care in the best interest of the patient."
This Act is attempting to deceive Alaskan into thinking we are voting for compassion of those having "debilitating" illnesses. The Act is attempting to use the sick, infirmed and dying to pry open the door to drug legalization. From 1991 to 1996 marijuana use nationwide among eight graders tripled from 6% to 18%. Any legalization of marijuana sends the wrong message to the youth of Alaska. Marijuana is the gateway drug to cocaine, heroin, and methamphetamine. As a result, this Act is opposed by local, state, and federal law enforcement officers.
The use of illegal drugs, including marijuana, leads to lack of individual self respect, as well as lack of respect of others and society in general. Ultimately, marijuana and other illegal drugs destroy an individuals mind, as well as the "soul". Since marijuana users are not able to distinguish between "right from wrong" the burden of use of illegal drugs is ultimately placed on each of us individually and society as a whole.
Legalization of marijuana tells our youth that adults believe illegal can be used responsibly. Within that atmosphere it is very difficult, if not impossible, to reach our youth and convince them that "doing drugs is bad." The youth of Alaska need our support.
Do not be fooled, this Act is not about compassion or care for the sick, infirmed, and dying. The Act is an attempt to protect those who grow, transport, distribute, sell, possess or use marijuana.
please vote against this Act.
Wevley William Shea
Anchorage
(907) 274-0020
MEDICAL MARIJUANA MEASURE IS ABOUT GREED. Editorial
Wevley William Shea
Anchorage Daily News
10-12-98
Ballot Measure No. 8, "Allowing Medical Use of Marijuana," before Alaska voters in November, would be a bad law. All Alaskans concerned about the future of this great state should vote no on Ballot Measure No. 8. It creates a large new "bureaucratic Agency" in the department of Health and Social Services.
Ballot measure No. 8 requires a confidential registry of drug user patients. It requires the state to police the medical use of marijuana .Ballot measure 8 allows the drug user patient or the caregiver to cultivate, grow, possess and distribute marijuana for the patient. The patient and/or caregiver may grow and possess the following amounts of grass.
1. No more than 1 ounce of marijuana in usable form.
2. No More than 6 marijuana plants, with no more than three mature flowering plants producing usable marijuana at any time.
Basically, the patient drug user is allowed to grow his own pot. There is absolutely no quality control provisions in Ballot Measure No. 8. The patient physician would be prescribing "street-grade grass" for an alleged "debilitating condition.
"Debilitating" is so broadly defined in the bill as a medical condition that it can easily be misused by the patient, caregiver and or the prescribing physician.
The psychoactive ingredient in marijuana, tetrahyrocannbinol, is commonly referred to as THC. Today the THC or psychoactive ingredient in high quality-street grass is 50 to 100 times stronger than the pot of the 1960's smoked at the Filmore West, Golden Gate park and the Haight-Ashbury district of San Francisco. Many of the 1960s free-thinkers are now trying to push legalization nation wide
Within 50 miles of Anchorage, marijuana with the highest THC content ever recorded is cultivated, grown, distributed and smoked. This is a very cash rich crop that sells in the area of $7,000 to $8,0000 per pound. This pot is raised in ideal indoor growing conditions and grafted to the best strains worldwide to achieve its exceptional quality.
The grass growing business is do cash rich that individuals are willing to risk everything to receive the high economic benefit. . Those at the top of the marijuana distribution chain do not use the product. They know the effects of marijuana on the mind, body, and soul. It destroys motivation, understanding and growth in all users, especially Alaska's youths.
Marinol (Dronabinal) is an approved drug that contains the principal psychoactive substance in marijuana. Physicians prescribe this approved, quality-controlled drug for symptoms ranging from anorexia in AIDS patients to nausea associated with Cancer chemotherapy. Street-grade grass is not needed, nor is it a substitute for Marinol.
The psychoactive effect of marijuana is parallel to Marinol on drug users: decreased cognitive performance and memory, decreased ability to control drives and impulses and alteration of reality, including distortions in perceptions of objects, sense of time, and hallucinations. In addition, drug users experience mood changes of euphoria, detachment, depression, anxiety, panic and paranoia. Street pot with no quality control is bad for any drug user.
Marinol is a controlled substance with high quality control requirements. Ballot Measure No. 8 has no quality control guidelines. The drug user can grow his own street grass of unknown psychoactive or THC content.
Ballot measure No. 8 is simply a bad law that creates another large state bureaucracy. Basically, Alaskans will be forced to pay for the ill advised control of illegal drug users. In addition, drug user patients, their caregivers and physicians prescribing the street grass are held harmless for the consequences of pot use. Alaskan society as a whole must bear the burden economically and socially of pot users.
How can a well meaning, professional and competent physician prescribe a psychoactive drug that has not been tested and has no quality control criteria? The answer is that he or she cannot in good faith and in the best interest of the patient prescribe psychoactive marijuana without knowing the potency. Ballot measure No.8 is so poorly conceived and drafted that it is even a disgrace to the marijuana-legalization movement nation wide. It appears that the author of ballot measure No. 8 may have been smoking the product he or she endorses during drafting the bill.
Do not be fooled. Ballot Measure No. 8 is not about helping debilitated patients, the sick, the infirm or the dying. The act is about crime and economic greed. Ballot Measure No. 8 is an attempt to misuse the alleged individual rights to protect individuals and entities that grow, distribute, sell, transport, possess or use marijuana.
Legalization of marijuana tells Alaska youths that adults believe an illegal, non controlled street drug can be used responsibly. No drug can used responsibly when the "prescribing physician" has no knowledge of the strength of the psychoactive ingredient or THC.
Alaska youths need your support. Vote no on ballot measure No. 8. Approval of this bill would make it difficult, if not impossible, to reach Alaska's youths and convince them doing drugs is bad.
Wevley Shea is an Anchorage attorney and a former US attorney for Anchorage
A Pro medicinal cannabis rebuttal
POSITION STATEMENT ON WEV SHEA'S COMMENTS ON MEDICINAL CANNABIS
Position statement release date 10-27-1998
Position statement complied and written by
Charles Rollins Jr
On November 3 we Alaskans will be voting on an important issue -- The medicinal use of Cannabis, better known as marijuana. Medical use of Marijuana has been proven to alleviate the suffering of individuals with specific life threatening illnesses. Pros and Cons of this issue appear in the State of Elections Pamphlet.
Although the opponents of this important measure try to take the moral high ground on this issue, they fail to address the most vital issues of the sick and infirm. They do not address the right to personal dignity, and the basic rights to privacy. Nor do they address the legal mattersassociated with this petition, such as:
1. The State maintained registry of patients, open to law enforcement. The requirement to carry an ID card. No other medical treatment permits such affront to privacy of the ill.
2. The alternative to the listing of name with the State is proving in court by a preponderance (greater portion) of the evidence that you are innocent of illegal use. In other words the sick are no longer innocent until proven guilty, they are guilty until proven innocent
3. It will be a state agency that will approve your medication, not your personal physician. There is no provision within the new law that any bureaucrat making the decision have any medical training. Your medical doctor may only recommend.
4. This law will segregate the sick into a class unto their own. Only specific illnesses are covered. It does not matter if your physician believes you may benefit if your illness falls out of the specific classification.
5. Legal issue remain at question, such as petitioners who registered to vote with a false address, collected 4000 signatures and then disappeared, the dedication of funds, violation of the 30 day grace, etc
In place of ethics, law, and factual information, the medical marijuana opponents choose to follow a path of a questionable nature.
It is claimed that THC levels where astronomically higher that just a decade earlier. Actually a Potency Monitoring Project at the University of Mississippi (the only official program that measured potency of cannabis) shows no consistent upward or downward trend, but a fluctuation of a mere 2 to 3.5 percent[1]. Alaskan opponents of medicinal cannabis are now promoting "pure THC" in synthetic form instead of "crude cannabis".
The second motive for recriminalzation was to send a message to our children in hope to keep kids off drugs, and reduce drug use.
Yet, according to the opponents of medical Cannabis marijuana use has climbed on a national level since 1991. Specific numbers for Alaska were not provided, but it must be assumed that the trend was also seen in Alaska. And the September 4th 1998 issue of the Fairbanks Daily News Miner, Zoran Yankovich, lead DEA agent stated "In the last few years, it (sic-drug use) has picked up tremendously."
Does it sound like the grand experiment "sending a message" or "get on tough on drugs" worked? Apparently not. Yet now the opponents use these same arguments to deny the sick a medication of proven worth.
A survey completed by Senator Paul Simon of prison wardens disclosed 85% of the prison wardens surveyed felt elected officials weren't offering effective Solutions. It also found that 65% wanted shorter sentences for non violent offenders and longer sentences for violent offenders. Eighty-nine percent of the same wardens favored treatment to reduce prison recidivism. Prison Wardens see the end result of this countries drug policies[2].
They also assert "Now, at a time when illegal drug use is destroying the very foundation of our Nation, and this great state - the family unit -- this Act is attempting to legalize marijuana as a medicine."
What About Alcohol? The Department of public Safety in their "1996 Drug and Alcohol Enforcement Report to the Governor and the Alaska Legislature" stated "Alcohol is the primary substance of abuse in Alaska and is the leading cause of violence and accidental deaths in Alaska."
How about the negative effect of massive Civil rights violations on families?
---- William Foster (Rheumatoid arthritis patient) who was sentence to 93 years in prison for cultivating medical Cannabis. This sentence was reduced to 20 years by the Oklahoma Court of Criminal Appeals.
---- James Cox (cancer) was sentence to 15 years in prison for cultivating medicinal cannabis.
For anyone to spend one moment in prison, in an attempt end their suffering or to save their life is a "moral outrage". The opponents of medicinal cannabis call it "justice"
Another claim is "The Act has no provisions to protect against the impurities from 'street grass' "
Marijuana is a naturally grown substance. It is just as "crude", or impure as tomatoes, especially if self produced. . If the law changed, and patients weren't prosecuted, cannabis would likely be inspected just as many food items are presently inspected.
They declare "Dronabinol (marinol) is an approved, controlled drug, that is the principal "psychoactive substance in marijuana . Physicians prescribe Dronabinol for symptoms ranging from nausea associated with cancer chemotherapy, to anorexia in AIDs patients"
The drug, Dronabinol is extremely expensive (almost $300 for 1mg), and can cost $30,000.00 per year[3]. What if you don't have insurance, or your policy is canceled? Or perhaps it does not cover specific life threatening illnesses. According to The Journal of the American Medical Association, 1 in 4 Americans have either no health insurance or inadequate coverage. A 1993 Harris poll revealed that Americans pay more for out of the pocket for health care than citizens of countries. The Urban Institute concluded that the lack of health insurance is associated with a 25% higher risk of death[4].
Personal experience has taught me that State Aid is only for the truly destitute. You cannot have a home, you cannot have a car, you cannot make more than 300.00 dollar a month.
What of the Synthetic THC (Marinol)? In 1978 a NCI memo stated they felt marinol was not acceptable for use in humans, and also stated that "all in all the (marijuana) cigarette perhaps the best means of administering the drug" [5]. A random sample, anonymous survey of the American Society of Clinical Oncology[6], completed in the Spring of 1990 found, of the respondents 28% felt they had enough information to compare Cannabis to Marinol:
44% believed cannabis to be more effective.
13% believed marinol to be more effective,
43% though they we're equally effective
77% of those who had a preference, preferred Cannabis
They maintain "The use of illegal drugs, including marijuana, leads to lack of individual self respect, as well as lack of respect for society in general. Ultimately, marijuana and other illegal drugs destroy an individual mind as well as the `soul'. Since marijuana users are not able to distinguish between `right from wrong' the burden of use of illegal drugs is placed on each of us individually and society as a whole."
Brain waves of chronic Cannabis users electroencephalographs (EEGs) can not be distinguished between non users by just a visual exam. One study have shown a difference between heavy users and occasional users. Another study which was the only study that took into account Age, and used healthy subjects who displayed no difference in Event-Related Potential in their EEGs.
THC has caused Brain damage in animals who were given at least 100 times the psychoactive dose as would be taken by humans to get desired effect. Sheer logic would tell us no one would use 100 times the amount that is needed to get the needed effect [7].
It is also interesting to Note that when Mr. Shea was informed of possible violations in the petition process, and ethical matters of the proposed law, he refused to listen because he did not like the informers politics. Certainly the opponents official opposition due to moral consideration must be questioned, if their spokesman feels violation of laws and ethics is no big deal.
They allege "Legalization of marijuana tells our youth that adults believe illegal drugs can be used responsibly. Within that atmosphere it is very difficult, if not impossible, to reach our youth and convince them that 'doing drugs is bad'. The youth of Alaska need our support"
Ending the abuse of any and all substances is a noble ideal, sending the right messages is a good idea too. Yet we fail to address what message we are sending?
Recently North Star Borough Schools two local schools felt the DARE program was effective in preventing drug abuse. School officials permitted the program to be canceled with no other prevention program in place. This also sends a message.
The "Partnership for a Drug-Free America", has Failed to address the issues of Alcohol, Tobacco, and prescription drug abuse. This program is sponsored by Drug, alcohol, and tobacco manufactures like Anheuser-Bush, Phillip Morris, Hoffman-La Rouche[8].
The National Governors Association allows drug manufactures, alcohol and tobacco producers to partake in its policies. A donation of up to $12,000 dollars the Association designates these Corporations a "Corporate fellow". A few companies who have participated in this are Phillip Morris (alcohol and tobacco) and Pfizer(pharmaceutical)[9].
What message do we send when we allow companies producing alcohol, tobacco, and prescription drugs to become a part of policy making. One hundred and Six thousand people die each year in US hospital due to Adverse reaction to prescription drugs. Only Heart disease, Cancer, and strokes kill more. Two million two hundred thousand people in hospitals suffer serious but not fatal adverse reactions to drugs[10]. California Advocates for Nursing Homes Reform (CANHR), reported in 1995 32,103 were administered psycho tropic medications and chemical restraints a 12% increase over 1994 [11].
The abuse of all substances must end. Yet, are we taking the most effective Direction? Money and property are seized, users are jailed rather than treated, lives are destroyed. Yet, the destruction of the "very foundation of our nation and this great state" seems to be the War on drugs itself.
What of those of us speak of reforming the current polices? Should we send a clear , and coherent message of what we want, or should we continue down the same path we now seem to be following?
To
my cites
A rebuttal to Alan Leshner claims on cannabis
Dear Mr. Leshner,
I received an your article published in the Boston Globe on 22 Nov 1998, titled "MARIJUANA ISN'T A HARMLESS DRUG." I believe we both share a common concern over raising healthy youths. Even with this collective cause, I still must strongly disagree with many of the points made.
Two of these points were also discussed in the House of Lords Science and Technology -Ninth report released on November 4 1998. They are:
* Damage to lungs and immune system, found no epidemiological connection between Cancer and cannabis consumption. It did hint at possible respiratory problems with extremely heavy long term use. I emphasize 'possible' since many other studies counter these findings.
* Mental/neurological effects: Complex Cognitive function might be effected in the long term but these effects are slight, and the existence of the theory is extremely controversial.
Among the numerous claims, and studies made by your agency and other federal agencies showing the danger of cannabis other studies refute these claims.
It is argued that the federal government, its agencies, and our elected officials are extremely concerned over public health. Thus, they will move extremely cautiously with any matter that may expose the public to 'danger'. With all due respect I consider this a fallacy when you consider:
a. According to the Journal of Pesticides Reform (Winter 1995) of the top 25 pesticides used in the United States five are toxic to the nervous system, 18 can damage skin, eyes, and lungs. Approximately half of these commonly used pesticides are classified as Cancer causing chemicals by the EPA, 17 of these 25 cause genetic damage in laboratory test, 10 may cause reproductive problem, six have been shown to disrupt hormone systems.(Breast Cancer: Poisons Profits and preventions, Liane Clorfene-Casten. Common Courage Press, page 53)
"A consensus statement (1995, Erice statement) released by of 18 scientific experts in August 1995 on chemical threats to immune systems concluded. "The potential exists for widespread immuno toxicity in human life and wildlife species because of the worldwide lack of appropriate protective standards... The risk of exposure to known immunomodulators is sufficient to warrant regulatory approaches that would limit exposure." (Our Stolen Future, Colborn, Dumanoski, Peterson, Plume/Penguin books, 1997, Page 253)
"Have we done our part in limiting exposure of world citizens to these risks? No! According to a report by Foundation for Advancements in Science and Education 22.3 million pounds of severely restricted (in the United States) pesticides were exported in 1992 to 1994 to foreign governments. This includes 600,000 pounds of DDT." (PANUPS, Increases in U. S. Export of Hazardous Pesticides March 25 1996)
"DDT is seen as a an extremely dangerous pesticides, that can cause the fore mentioned negative other health effects plus myriad of other negative health effects in part per million or Parts per billion."
Despite these facts these toxins reenter our food supply, and can accumulate over prolonged exposure. We should also have a grave concern over the health impacts of these chemicals on the citizens of other countries that import these chemicals.
What causes such grand hypocrisy? Can we justify it by claiming that some people must have these pesticides even if they are a danger to the health of their people, because without it these toxins their crops would be decimated by insects? The same claims can be made for the medicinal use of cannabis for the ill and infirm. Perhaps such medication is their only effective means of survival.
Part of the answer can be found in the money trail that ends in Washington DC. It is often claimed that billionaires subvert the democratic process in regard to drug policy and especially medical marijuana. However, lobbyist activities reported in Center for Responsive Politics Report (Influence Inc) 1997 fails to show any evidence of "drug law reformers" in the list of top 100 lobbyist. Nor does it show any group that has consistently shown sympathies for the drug reform movement. What it does show is a who's who of industry of big business and labor unions. Neither of these two groups have consistently supported reform of this nations drug laws. In fact many of these groups have a strong motivation to oppose any sane and rational policy toward industrial threats to the public health.
In summation, I still wonder when this country will be a leader in the area of public health. Instead we have a failed policy of enforcement driven drug policy. Lest we forget, in 1989 the Bush administration vowed a goal of reducing cocaine availability by 15% by the fall of 1991. Actually, cocaine production increased in south America by 28% in 1990, and another 8% in 1991. (Imperial Alibis, Stephen Shalom, 1993 South End Press, Page190)
Over the past few decades our polices in both drugs and pollution have been jokes. The sad thing is, people aren't laughing over this, in fact many are dying.
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