Anti-Drug Politics Impede Medical Use of Marijuana

Two government bureaucracies have recently decided to uphold
regressive positions on the therapeutic use of marijuana
(Cannabis sativa), and the effect of the decisions was given an
added sting by the death last week of Barbra Jenks, a Florida
woman with AIDS who was once arrested for growing marijuana for
her personal medical use.

On March 18, The U. S. Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA)
decided to uphold its barricade against medical access to
marijuana. (For background information, see AIDS TREATMENT NEWS
issues #131 and #139.) The decision comes almost one year after
a Court of Appeals ordered the DEA to reconsider that position,
and one week after the U. S. Public Health Service revealed that
it would not expand its compassionate-use marijuana program
(beyond the twelve patients now receiving government-grown drug).
An estimated 300 people had applications pending for
compassionate access to marijuana.

The decisions have been widely and sharply criticized.
While the oral drug Marinol (a pharmaceutical version of
marijuana's component THC) is available by prescription, many
people with severe nausea and vomiting prefer marijuana. The
Public Health Service argument that smoking marijuana could cause
lung infections is generally regarded as specious, since the
dried plant can easily be sterilized. The American public
appears to support medical access to marijuana: 35 states have
acknowledged its therapeutic value, and last November the city of
San Francisco voted four to one to add it to California's list of
approved medicines.

Reaction to the decisions was particularly critical from
four organizations which have been working to reverse the
criminalization of medical marijuana: the Alliance for Cannabis
Therapeutics (ACT), the Marijuana AIDS Research Service (MARS),
and the Drug Policy Foundation, all based in Washington, D. C.,
and the American Medical Marijuana Movement (AMMM), based in San
Francisco.

Spokespersons for ACT and the Drug Policy Foundation told us
that lawmakers are timidly deferring to the Bush administration's
indiscriminate war on drugs, and that they need to hear from the
public to chart a more rational course. ACT is encouraging people
who disagree with the government's position on medical marijuana
to register their opinion with their senators and congressional
representatives, and with the following legislative committees:

* Labor and Human Resources, Room SD-428, U. S. Senate,
Washington, D. C., 20010, telephone 202/224-5375.

* Subcommittee on Health, 2415 RHOB, U. S. Congress,
Washington, D. C., 20015, telephone 202/225-4952.

For more discussion of the role of marijuana in HIV therapy,
we recommend the book "Marijuana & AIDS: Pot, Politics & PWAs in
America," written by Robert Randall, President of ACT, and
published by Galen Press. The book includes a chapter comparing
marijuana and Marinol, as well as testimony given at a DEA
hearing by Ivan Silverberg, M. D., a San Francisco oncologist who
has treated many people with AIDS.

Barbra Jenks, who died on March 28, was in the eye of the
national media when she and her husband Kenny went on trial for
marijuana cultivation. The Florida Supreme Court eventually
cleared the couple of the charges by reason of medical necessity,
and Kenny Jenks continues to survive with AIDS. In 1990, in her
affidavit for the trial, Ms. Jenks told the court:

"In every sense of the word, marijuana made a critical
difference in my medical care. We were not throwing up. We were
eating well and our weight was coming back. Kenny, despite his
low T-cell count, continued working and bringing home a paycheck.
Our mood was good.

"Because we were eating well, we were able to continue
taking AZT, the only drug known to help retard the HIV virus.
Many patients, unable to tolerate the intense nausea and vomiting
of AIDS and AZT therapy, are forced to quit AZT. Unable to
tolerate treatment, their disease becomes progressive and they
rapidly fall prey to opportunistic infections. Marijuana helped
us avoid this dangerous trap.

"Things went on like this for a year. Our health was stable,
our spirits good. We stayed out of the hospital and with each
other. Odd as this may seem, we were generally happy. I thank
God for each day I am alive and try to make the best of each day."

Comment

The eloquence of Barbra Jenks, a 25-year old woman with
AIDS, won a victory in Florida for all people who may one day
need to use marijuana. She spent her limited time and energy
fighting what many consider a foolish and heartless national
policy. Meanwhile, the federal government remains intransigent
on the issue. Dennis Peron of AMMM told us that California alone
spends $17 million annually trying (unsuccessfully) to eradicate
marijuana cultivation, and that the U. S. government's total
expenditures for its controversial drug war is $17 billion a
year. Such a sum invites us to question why funding for medical
research and health care is always a struggle at budget time.
Perhaps these grossly tilted priorities will yet become an
election-year issue.