MEASURE 33 IS WRONG PRESCRIPTION ON MARIJUANA

Study Medical Effectiveness Before Expanding Distribution

Medical-marijuana advocates wrote a lousy law six years ago and talked
Oregon voters into passing it. Measure 33 would only make that law worse.

About 10,000 Oregonians now use marijuana with a doctor's prescription to
ease pain, nausea and conditions such as glaucoma and muscle spasms. Many
say marijuana has allowed them to live comfortably with far less medication
than before.

That news is encouraging; however, public policy should be based on
scientific research, not anecdotes. Until we know more, it doesn't make
sense to vastly expand this program.

Under current law, registered patients legally can get a limited amount of
marijuana by either growing it themselves or having a caregiver grow it for
them for free. Measure 33's backers say that's a hardship for seriously ill
people, and some patients wind up buying marijuana on the black market.

Measure 33 would "fix" that by multiplying the number of people eligible to
get prescriptions, the number of places they can get marijuana, the amount
of marijuana they and their caregivers can keep on hand -- and who can
prescribe the drug.

Marijuana could be prescribed for any "debilitating medical condition."
Meanwhile, a commission would be created with the power to overrule
marijuana-related decisions by the State Department of Human Services.

The potential danger is that virtually anyone could get the OK to plant a
plot and play medical-marijuana pharmacist under the guise of being a
dispensary. A patient legally could keep as much as 6 pounds of marijuana
- -- a year's supply -- at one time. A licensed marijuana dispensary could
have far more on hand.

This measure does an end run around the folks who know about the flip side
of illicit drugs -- police and the courts. It even requires police to check
with the Department of Human Services before obtaining a search warrant for
some marijuana investigations.

A task force composed of health and law enforcement officials and
medical-marijuana advocates tried to come up with a more moderate proposal
for the 2005 Legislature. Unfortunately, the group fell apart this year
when law enforcement members walked out.

Oregon's venture into medical marijuana does put government in a bind. It's
strange to see one arm of the state OK marijuana for some uses while
another arm arrests people for possessing it. But then it also is strange
that the state profits from tobacco -- which has no beneficial use -- and
alcohol, yet campaigns against smoking and alcohol abuse.

Oregon ought to encourage research and find workable ways to get medical
marijuana to patients while minimizing illegal use. But Measure 33 isn't
the solution.