The White House has finally peeled back one of the many layers of red tape obscuring medical marijuana research. After years of lobbying from marijuana advocates, they removed the Clinton-era Public Health Service (PHS) Review, which required every application for marijuana research to undergo an individualized review.
This provided a unique hurdle to marijuana research—no other Schedule I drug (cocaine or heroin, for example) was required to undergo the review.
Drug czar spokesman Mario Moreno Zepeda told the Huffington Post, “The Obama Administration has actively supported scientific research on whether marijuana or its components can be safe and effective medicine. Eliminating the Public Health Service review should help facilitate additional research to advance our understanding of both the adverse effects and potential therapeutic uses for marijuana or its components.”
“This announcement shows that the White House is ready to move away from the war on medical marijuana, and enable the performance of legitimate and necessary research,” the Drug Policy Alliance’s Bill Piper said in a statement. “There’s huge momentum surrounding marijuana reform, and this is just the latest example.”
DPA was quick to note, however, that more reform is needed. Marijuana is still the only Schedule I drug, for example, that may not be produced in private labs for experimentation. The National Institute on Drug Abuse tightly controls all production for research purposes.
This issue, as well as the PHS review, were both addressed in the CARERs act, a bill that would eliminate many barriers to medical marijuana research. Senators Rand Paul, (R-Ky), Kirsten Gillibrand (D-N.Y.), and Cory Booker (D-N.Y.) introduced it in March of this year.
Although some hoped President Obama would bring a wave of marijuana reform to the White House, until now he has done little to improve things, even remarking recently that young people should stop caring so much about marijuana legalization.
