State lawmakers shouldn't kid themselves about the looming fork in the road for medical marijuana, or the inescapable tradeoffs.
On the one hand, they can pass some version of Denver Sen. Chris Romer's plan to provide state licenses to marijuana dispensaries and growers. But if do, they'll solidify a marijuana industry that serves not only a rapidly growing number of genuine patients but many recreational-minded frauds as well. And Colorado will have created, in one fell swoop, a class of potentially influential marijuana entrepreneurs.
Or, lawmakers can elect to return to the medical marijuana model that Colorado followed before this year's explosion of retail dispensaries (brought about in part by a change in federal enforcement policy). If they take this path, the industry will once again sink below the public's radar as dispensaries disappear. Meanwhile, however, hundreds and maybe thousands of legitimate patients who swear by marijuana's effectiveness will be forced into an anxious world where they secure their pain or nausea relief from unregulated strangers.
As the debate sharpens, advocates on either side will deny this tradeoff exists. Some will claim that the previous system worked just fine and that dispensaries cater to a clientele that for the most part is gaming the system. Their opponents, meanwhile, will pack hearing rooms with patients relating poignant stories of their suffering before dispensaries emerged, while insisting that a well-written law will screen out bad actors.
Neither side's claims are fully believable.
Romer is determined to limit fraud, for example, by nudging the state toward a medical model of dispensing marijuana. His bill refers to marijuana "clinics," and defines a "bona fide physician-patient relationship" as one in which doctors complete "a full assessment of the registered patient's medical history and current medical condition, including a personal physical examination." In an effort to limit conflicts of interest, the senator also would bar physicians from owning clinics or receiving payments from them.
While that might clean up the business a bit, it can't possibly eliminate abuse. Doctors who hadn't bothered with a physical exam of patients seeking a marijuana permit will now resign themselves to a cursory one of a few minutes. This is hardly an unbearable cross for a physician dedicated for whatever reason to qualify as many medical marijuana applicants as he can.
And if the state tries to pile additional requirements on doctors, it will run smack against the terms of voter-passed Amendment 20.
The deeper obstacle to the clinical model is that although doctors authorize medical marijuana use, it's patients and caregivers – typically boasting about as much clinical experience as the average shoe salesman – who decide on the "dosage" and how to ingest it. Romer would offer chiropractors, nurses, physical therapists and optometrists a shortcut to treating medical-marijuana patients, but for everyone who turns, say, to a nurse there will be someone else choosing to graze at the smorgasbords in places like the Ganja Gourmet, which opened recently on South Broadway. A restaurant model, anyone?
The choice is clear: Lawmakers deeply disturbed about fraud should make it hard on dispensaries. Those more concerned about patient access to marijuana should allow dispensaries to flourish.
And both sides should admit that any solution will be messy.
News Hawk- Ganjarden 420 MAGAZINE ® - Medical Marijuana Publication & Social Networking
Source: The Denver Post
Author: Vincent Carroll
Contact: The Denver Post
Copyright: 2009 The Denver Post
Website: Colorado's Marijuana Mess
On the one hand, they can pass some version of Denver Sen. Chris Romer's plan to provide state licenses to marijuana dispensaries and growers. But if do, they'll solidify a marijuana industry that serves not only a rapidly growing number of genuine patients but many recreational-minded frauds as well. And Colorado will have created, in one fell swoop, a class of potentially influential marijuana entrepreneurs.
Or, lawmakers can elect to return to the medical marijuana model that Colorado followed before this year's explosion of retail dispensaries (brought about in part by a change in federal enforcement policy). If they take this path, the industry will once again sink below the public's radar as dispensaries disappear. Meanwhile, however, hundreds and maybe thousands of legitimate patients who swear by marijuana's effectiveness will be forced into an anxious world where they secure their pain or nausea relief from unregulated strangers.
As the debate sharpens, advocates on either side will deny this tradeoff exists. Some will claim that the previous system worked just fine and that dispensaries cater to a clientele that for the most part is gaming the system. Their opponents, meanwhile, will pack hearing rooms with patients relating poignant stories of their suffering before dispensaries emerged, while insisting that a well-written law will screen out bad actors.
Neither side's claims are fully believable.
Romer is determined to limit fraud, for example, by nudging the state toward a medical model of dispensing marijuana. His bill refers to marijuana "clinics," and defines a "bona fide physician-patient relationship" as one in which doctors complete "a full assessment of the registered patient's medical history and current medical condition, including a personal physical examination." In an effort to limit conflicts of interest, the senator also would bar physicians from owning clinics or receiving payments from them.
While that might clean up the business a bit, it can't possibly eliminate abuse. Doctors who hadn't bothered with a physical exam of patients seeking a marijuana permit will now resign themselves to a cursory one of a few minutes. This is hardly an unbearable cross for a physician dedicated for whatever reason to qualify as many medical marijuana applicants as he can.
And if the state tries to pile additional requirements on doctors, it will run smack against the terms of voter-passed Amendment 20.
The deeper obstacle to the clinical model is that although doctors authorize medical marijuana use, it's patients and caregivers – typically boasting about as much clinical experience as the average shoe salesman – who decide on the "dosage" and how to ingest it. Romer would offer chiropractors, nurses, physical therapists and optometrists a shortcut to treating medical-marijuana patients, but for everyone who turns, say, to a nurse there will be someone else choosing to graze at the smorgasbords in places like the Ganja Gourmet, which opened recently on South Broadway. A restaurant model, anyone?
The choice is clear: Lawmakers deeply disturbed about fraud should make it hard on dispensaries. Those more concerned about patient access to marijuana should allow dispensaries to flourish.
And both sides should admit that any solution will be messy.
News Hawk- Ganjarden 420 MAGAZINE ® - Medical Marijuana Publication & Social Networking
Source: The Denver Post
Author: Vincent Carroll
Contact: The Denver Post
Copyright: 2009 The Denver Post
Website: Colorado's Marijuana Mess
