MARIJUANA PRESCRIPTION

State Should Work For Federal Law To Allow Legal Distribution Of Drug

Maine legislators are taking another, hesitant look at the question of
marijuana distribution under the state's medical marijuana law following
this week's ruling by the U.S. Supreme Court. Justices struck down
California's system of selling pot through cooperatives, meaning a bill to
set up a state distribution system in Maine could be doomed.

Or not. Varying interpretations of the ruling have been offered from
various quarters and will be debated in coming weeks. Gov. Angus King is
expected to veto the distribution bill if it gets as far as his desk.

The official hesitation is understandable. The Supreme Court's unanimous
ruling seems to have thrown cold water on the whole medical marijuana
business, with Justice Clarence Thomas declaring that pot's medical value
has never been scientifically proven and that barring proof, the drug must
remain illegal.

What the state should not do now is cave in. The court didn't tell states
to begin arresting patients who use small amounts of marijuana to ease
nausea from chemotherapy, to calm muscle spasms from multiple sclerosis, or
to restore appetite lost to the AIDS virus.

Someday patients' stories of success using marijuana for those purposes
might be proven to the satisfaction of Justice Thomas but until then, the
stories can't be ignored. One York County doctor said he has written
several permission slips for patients seeking relief from extreme pain and
nausea through marijuana.

It's not that he's seen scientific proof of the drug's value, he said, just
that he believes his patients and feels for them.

We could be waiting a long time to get mainstream scientific proof of
marijuana's medicinal value. Most research is paid for by pharmaceutical
companies that hope eventually to profit from a drug's safe use or by the
government. Drug companies are unlikely to make money off a substance that
can be grown in the back yard, and the federal government seems too busy
lumping marijuana in with more harmful substances to further its medicinal use.

Maine should continue to study its options for distribution so that doctors
don't have to continue to give their patients such vague advice as "use pot
if it helps, but I have no idea how you'll find it."

The basis for Maine's 1999 medical marijuana law is compassion. The drug
can ease suffering for a small minority of residents who use it. The
suffering hasn't gone away, nor the potential benefit, simply because of
the opinions of eight justices in Washington.

Maine should lobby for a change in federal law that would allow legal
distribution. And it should continue to let compassion be its guide on this
issue.