cannabisnews.com: Medical Group Finds it Hard to Get High on Law!





Medical Group Finds it Hard to Get High on Law!
Posted by FoM on March 22, 1999 at 06:12:25 PT

Oregon's Medical Marijuana law went down smoothly with voters last November. It passed by more than 100,000 votes, or 54 percent. That voter mandate, however, is turning out to be a harsh toke for the Oregon Medical Association. 
The OMA is concerned that Oregon physicians who cooperate with the state law may put themselves at risk legally with the federal government. A week after the law was enacted last December, the OMA newsletter urged doctors to refrain from participating in the law until the federal government took a position on the act and until the Oregon Health Division adopted rules for doctors and patients. The health division rules, due May 1, are expected to formalize the marijuana registration process. Without the OMA's stamp of approval--it represents 6,000 members--last November's vote on medical marijuana may turn out to be as potent as an ounce of oregano. The OMA's legal hand wringing isn't unwarranted. While the Oregon law allows patients who suffer from specified conditions to legally possess small amounts of marijuana it never explains how the patient may obtain the marijuana. "The way the law is written, I'm not sure how (marijuana) is going to magically appear in someone's home and just start growing," said Kelly Paige, the Oregon Health Division's program coordinator on medical marijuana. Under federal law, marijuana is a Schedule 1 drug, which means it's illegal to buy or sell. It's also illegal to aid or abet someone who's trying to buy or sell the drug. "I'm assuming that a number of people are buying and I'm assuming there are people who are growing," said Dr. Grant Higginson, deputy administrator for the Oregon Health Division. "But since the act doesn't say where to get it, we don't have any expectations." The notion of aiding and abetting makes the OMA nervous. Under Oregon's medical marijuana law, physicians are supposed to serve as intermediaries between the patients and the state, providing state bureaucrats with relevant medical information about patients who are seeking a marijuana permit. Paige said the health division rules make it clear that doctors are not writing prescriptions. She said writing prescriptions for pot would put doctors in legal hot water because they would be "aiding and abetting" a patient's ability to buy the drug--a federal crime. If the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration decides that a physician--by writing some sort of marijuana "doctor's note"--is assisting efforts to buy pot, then doctors who participate may risk losing their DEA licenses. Those licenses allow physicians to prescribe Schedule II drugs such as cocaine, morphine, Demerol and Percodan. "If physicians lose their DEA license," said Paul Frisch, director of medical legal affairs for the OMA, "they lose their business." The health division is doing everything it can to accommodate nervous doctors. For example, in draft rules on the marijuana licensing process the health division obliged the OMA by allowing physicians to forgo signing and filling out a medical marijuana form. The OMA believes such a form, which patients would present to the state to obtain a marijuana license, would put a physician on shaky legal footing. "(A form) puts the physician in an active role," Frisch said. "Stating things in a form might help the patient avoid prosecution, but it also might help them obtain marijuana, and that's aiding and abetting." Frisch said if the health division requires physicians to do anything beyond making simple notes in a patient's medical chart, he won't support the rules. Medical chart notes could fulfill health division requirements for a patient seeking a medical marijuana permit. The health division is preparing an official form, but it will also accept medical chart notes, said Paige. The health division rules, however, cannot satisfy all of the OMA's concerns about the DEA. Rhea Kessler, assistant attorney general and counsel to the health division, said: "It would be erroneous for us to draft rules saying the DEA will or will not do something. We can't guarantee anything about what the DEA will or will not do. We can't draft rules over things we don't have authority over." Kessler said she has not contacted the DEA for advice. The OMA's Frisch doubts that DEA officials will take kindly to Oregon's law, pointing out that the DEA warned physicians in California not to participate in 1996 after voters there passed a medical marijuana law. The DEA is currently in San Francisco federal court arguing against the law. Frisch cites a letter that federal officials sent to the California Medical Association in February 1997. It said: "Physicians may not intentionally provide their patients with oral or written statements in order to obtain controlled substances in violation of federal law. Physicians who do so risk revocation of their DEA prescription authority, criminal prosecution and exclusion from participation in Medicare and Medicaid programs." Frisch sent a letter to the DEA last week for clarification on its position. Tom O'Brien, a spokesman in Seattle for the DEA, said the federal marijuana law still stands and referred The Business Journal to the state Attorney General's office. Oregonians for Medical Rights, the group that helped author the law, thinks the OMA is overreacting. It points out that both the California Medical Association and the Washington Medical Association have cooperated with recent voter-approved medical marijuana laws by issuing guidelines for the membership. David Smigelski, a spokesman for the advocacy group, laments, "We're not going to see Oregon doctors really going along with this until it has been a year and no docs have been arrested." Smigelski, who has talked to at least 250 people planning to seek marijuana licenses through the state, said there are cancer, multiple sclerosis and AIDS patients from Ashland to Astoria who haven't been able to find cooperative physicians. "These are dying and suffering patients who can't wait," said Geoff Sugerman, director of Oregonians for Medical Rights. "No one has been arrested and the OMA is overreacting." Health division officials said they have received 60 marijuana license requests since the law went into effect Dec. 3. The majority of those requests included some form of notation from physicians. Sugerman said 50 to 75 people have written recommendations from their physicians. Assistant attorney general Eric Wasmann said the clearest way to describe legal possession is as follows: Under most circumstances, at the place where the marijuana is grown, you can possess three mature pot plants, four immature plants and an ounce of dried pot for each mature plant. At any other location, you can only possess on ounce of dried marijuana. Confused? If so, the Oregon Health Division is holding a public hearing regarding its medical marijuana rules April 15 at 800 N.E. Oregon St. http://www.amcity.com/portland/stories/1999/03/22/story5.html
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