The decision by the Drug Enforcement Administration, reported by news outlets late Wednesday, means marijuana will remain classified as a Schedule 1 drug. A formal announcement is expected Thursday.
Many scientists have been calling for the federal government to reschedule the drug, which they said would open the door to more medical research into marijuana and its potential effects, both beneficial and harmful.
To conduct research with Schedule 1 drugs, scientists have to gain DEA approval and often upgrade the security protocols in their labs, expensive and time-consuming hurdles.
Scientists have argued that thorough research is all the more important with medical marijuana available in 25 states and Washington, and a small number of states starting to legalize recreational marijuana as well.
Researchers also need the highest level of permission to run clinical trials of marijuana and drugs derived from it, and to study constituents of marijuana, even if they are free of the components that make people high.
A component of marijuana called cannabidiol has shown promise […]
Perhaps the government should look to their own patent on cannabinoids: “Patent No. 6630507, held by the United States Department of Health and Human Services, covers the use of cannabinoids for treating a wide range of diseases.
Under U.S. federal law, marijuana is defined as having no medical use. So it might come as a surprise to hear that the government owns one of the only patents on marijuana as a medicine.
The patent (US6630507) is titled “Cannabinoids as antioxidants and neuroprotectants” and was awarded to the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) in October 2003.
It was filed four years earlier, in 1999, by a group of scientists from the National Institute of Mental Health (NIMH), which is part of the National Institutes of Health (NIH).”
Thank you Stephen for the excellent set of articles today. This article illustrates the naked war of the DEA against the American people. Wars are ultimately against people, not concepts or objects. DEA intentionally rob humans of the right to treat illness with a plant, cruelty and inhumanity incarnate! Destroys civil rights and peoples lives, kills and imprisons for what good? Furthermore, restrictions on hemp have impinged our economy and the ability to create products with low environmental impact for generations. This agency must be eliminated and top officials prosecuted for crimes against humanity and violations of the U.S. constitution.
The DEA is still playing Nixon era politics.Unfortunately many Americans rot in prisons as a result of their cruel games.
In 1971 a commission of researchers commissioned by congress, containing mostly Republicans, came to the conclusion that marijuana should be legalized. They based their conclusion on “the basis that the actual use and potential harm of use of the drug was not great enough to justify intrusion by the criminal law into private behavior…”. The committee also recommended a policy of “partial prohibition” which allowed for the private, personal use of the substance. If one looks at the actual scientific evidence now on the subject, in the current peer-reviewed evidence such as that on the website pubmed.com where one can find out that this substance can cure most cancers, Alzhiemers, as well as one study that concluded that the more use the longer one may live (this was established in a study of mice in which the life span was significantly increased with daily use of marijuana). The EPA and FDA are ignorant puppets and so is the President for signing the new law which keeps the substance in a category one placement. It could put many big Pharma companies out of business.
Another factor is that on page two, God (of the Christian Bible) gave this substance to all, and obviously for good reason. If the tea party Christians would read their own book, they would know this.