Medical

Alarm Co. Cancels Contract With AIDS Patient Because Of Pot

By Steve Elliott ~alapoet~ on January 7, 2013 Growing, Medical, News

Alarm company ADT refuses to service medical marijuana patients who legally grow their own cannabis

A Sacramento, California AIDS patient who grows medical marijuana said his home alarm company of three years dropped him after a repairman saw cannabis plants inside his house.

“I still want to call the governor,” said the homeowner, Jay, who wanted to remain anonymous. “If this company doesn’t want to recognize our state laws, they maybe we shouldn’t license them [in California],” reports Richard Sharp at KCRA.

Administration Throwing Medical Marijuana Patients Into Federal Prison

By Steve Elliott ~alapoet~ on January 4, 2013 Medical, News

Pot.tv

Aaron Sandusky faces 10 years to life in federal prison. He will be sentenced next month.

This month will see a number of patients sentenced, sent to prison despite compliance with state medical marijuana laws

Fallout from the Obama Administration’s aggressive federal enforcement in medical marijuana states has reached a fever pitch this month with three people being sentenced, two others due to surrender to federal authorities to serve out sentences of up to five years in prison, and one federal trial in Montana currently scheduled for January 14.

Teen Pot Use Goes Down After AZ Legalizes Medical Marijuana

By Steve Elliott ~alapoet~ on January 3, 2013 Legislation, Medical, News

Since Arizona voters legalized medical marijuana at the polls two years ago, fewer teens in the state are trying pot, according to a study published recently by the Arizona Criminal Justice Commission.

According to the study [PDF], 28.7 percent of students surveyed admitted to using marijuana at least once, reports Stephen C. Webster at The Raw Story. That figure represents a drop from 29.9 percent in 2010. Medical marijuana legalization took effect in Arizona in 2011.

While about one in nine students who admitted using cannabis claimed they got it from a medical marijuana patient or caregiver who received it legally, the vast majority said they got it from friends, at parties or at school. The only category students cited less often than medical marijuana cardholders was “home,” but teens also cited “home” as the second most common place they got dangerous prescription drugs for illicit use.

Marijuana Groups Back Mendo’s Refusal To Give Records To Feds

By Steve Elliott ~alapoet~ on January 2, 2013 Growing, Medical, News

Marijuana Times

Advocates support county’s motion to quash, argue Obama Administration is attempting to undermine state law, violate patient privacy

Three medical marijuana groups have teamed up to support Mendocino County officials in their effort to fight a sweeping federal subpoena filed in October, seeking “any and all records” for the county’s medical marijuana cultivation program, otherwise known as County Code 9.31.

On December 21, Mendocino County filed a motion in San Francisco federal court to quash the Justice Department’s subpoena, and on Wednesday Americans for Safe Access (ASA) and the Emerald Growers Association (EGA) filed a joint amicus “friend of the court” brief in an attempt to protect the private patient records being sought.

Coleridge Knew In 1803 That Medical Marijuana Worked

By Steve Elliott ~alapoet~ on January 2, 2013 Culture, Medical

Review Books

Samuel Taylor Coleridge

A letter from 1803 reveals that early 19th century British Romantic poet Samuel Taylor Coleridge — known not only for his writing talent (“Rime of the Ancient Mariner”; “Kubla Khan”) but also for his opium appetite — was aware of the medical properties of cannabis, and that it would be useful in treating his friend’s intestinal ailments.

Coleridge wrote the letter to his landscape painter friend Samuel Purkis of Brentford, Middlesex, to ask about acquiring some bhang (a hashish preparation) for his friend Tom Wedgwood, according to the Australian maritime history website Merchant Networks.

He requested that Purkis ask the eminent Sir Joseph Banks — whom Coleridge had heard was in possession of some — for some bhang. Banks advised the government of Great Britain on what best to do to expand British-controlled supplies of hemp.

Coleridge wanted the bhang to treat the intestinal malady of his friend Tom Wedgwood, son of the famous potter Josiah Wedgwood; Sir Joseph Banks knew Josiah. As Banks probably knew, Tom’s health collapsed when he was about 21 — not coincidentally, when he was experimenting with silver nitrates and photography (the younger Wedgwood is credited with being the Father of Photography).

Study: Naloxone Cost-Effective In Preventing Overdose Deaths

By Steve Elliott ~alapoet~ on December 31, 2012 Medical, News

Prescribe To Prevent

The Annals of Internal Medicine released a study this week showing that giving heroin users the overdose antidote naloxone is a cost-effective way to prevent overdose death and save lives.

Phillip Coffin, MD, director of Substance Use Research at the San Francisco Department of Public Health and Assistant Clinical Professor at the University of California San Francisco, and Sean Sullivan, PhD, professor and director of the Pharmaceutical Outcomes Research and Policy Program at the University of Washington, co-authored the study.

Drug overdose is now the leading cause of injury death in the United States with opioids, such as heroin, accounting for about 80 percent of those deaths. Naloxone, according to its manufacturers, is a safe and effective antidote that works by temporarily blocking opioid receptors.

As of 2010, 183 public health programs around the country, including those supported by the San Francisco Department of Public Health, had trained more than 53,000 individuals in how to use naloxone. These programs had documented more than 10,000 cases of successful overdose reversals.

German Medical Marijuana Patients Allowed To Grow Their Own

By Steve Elliott ~alapoet~ on December 27, 2012 Global, Growing, Medical

Cannabis Culture

A court in Germany has ruled that seriously ill patients may grow their own cannabis for medicinal uses. However, the strict stipulations in the ruling could still prevent cultivation by some patients.

The December 7 ruling, which has not yet gone into effect, was made by a Federal Administrative Court in Münster, reports DW. Under the ruling, severely ill Germans — for whom no other therapies are available or effective, but who may receive a medical benefit from cannabis — may be allowed to grow medical marijuana at home.

Patients who wish to take part can apply to the Federal Institute for Drugs and Medical Devices (BfArM) for permission to treat themselves with homegrown marijuana, with use monitored by a medical doctor.

Does Teen Pot Use Cause Psychosis, Or Does Teen Psychosis Cause Pot Use?

By Steve Elliott ~alapoet~ on December 26, 2012 Medical, News

Addiction Inbox

Marijuana use may be linked to the development of psychotic symptoms in some teenagers, but the reverse could also be true: psychosis in adolescents may be linked to later pot use, according to a new study from the Netherlands.

“We have focused mainly on temporal order: Is it the chicken or the egg?” the study’s lead author Merel Griffith-Lendering, a doctoral candidate in the Netherlands, wrote to Reuters. “As the study shows, it is a bidirectional relationship.”

N.J. Apologizes For Privacy Breach In Medical Marijuana Email

By Steve Elliott ~alapoet~ on December 20, 2012 Dispensaries, Medical, News

State of New Jersey Department of Health

New Jersey’s Health Department has apologized after an email from the department included the visible email addresses of all recipients — revealing the email addresses of medical marijuana patient in the state. The department claimed it was taking steps to prevent the error from happening again.

Toke of the Town originally broke the story on Tuesday after registered New Jersey medical marijuana patient Susan Sturner let us know about the email which violated the privacy of patients.

NJ Medical Marijuana Program Violated Patient Privacy

By Steve Elliott ~alapoet~ on December 18, 2012 Dispensaries, Medical, News

Coalition for Medical Marijuana – New Jersey

Susan Sturner: “As a patient who is still waiting for my appointment to get my medicine, I am outraged”

New Jersey’s struggling medical marijuana program — slow-tracked by Republican Governor Chris Christie after being signed by his predecessor Democratic Governor Jon Corzine on his last day in office in 2010 — may have violated the confidentiality of patients with an email sent on Tuesday.

Patients have to be quite ill to qualify for the New Jersey’s Medical Marijuana Program (MMP); it is one of the strictest in the nation. Many of these patients have been desperately waiting for almost three years to get their legal marijuana, as their conditions deteriorate.

According to Susan Sturner, a registered N.J. MMP patient, “Today the state’s MMP sent out a nasty email to the sickest people in the state, those of us with the most debilitating diseases according to them.

“Not only is the email nasty and inappropriate,” Sturner told Toke of the Town, “it has all the email address of all the people signed up for the NJ MMP in the ‘to’ field, so everyone who received the email can see all of the other patients’ addresses.”

Browsing: Medical