| ostrowitzs / Flickr |
Despite growing evidence that marijuana is more than just a buzz-drug, a federal appeals court rejected an attempt to reclassify pot as a medically recognized substance.
The United States Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit today voted 2-1 to agree with lower courts that “adequate and well-controlled studies” do not exist to support the legitimacy of medical marijuana.
As it stands then, marijuana will remain a federal outlaw drug with no recognized uses — worse than cocaine in the federal government’s eyes.
The ruling won’t help those states like California that have legalized medical pot, as federal authorities can still cite its schedule I status and crackdown.
Joe Elford, chief counsel for plaintiff Americans for Safe Access:
To deny that sufficient evidence is lacking on the medical efficacy of marijuana is to ignore a mountain of well-documented studies that conclude otherwise. The Court has unfortunately agreed with the Obama Administration’s unreasonably raised bar on what qualifies as an ‘adequate and well-controlled’ study, thereby continuing their game of ‘Gotcha.’
ASA says it might appeal all the way to the U.S. Supreme Court. The group states:
ASA has consistently argued that the more than 200 peer-reviewed studies cited in the legal briefs adequately meet this standard [for legal, medical status].
This story originally appeared on LA Weekly’s Informer, a sister publication of Toke of the Town. Follow Dennis Romero on Twitter for more news out of Los Angeles.