LEGAL PROTECTION URGED FOR MEDICAL MARIJUANA

Critics Worry Drug Would Gain Legitimacy

Photo by AP Terry Keel: Texas lawmaker says his bill would give sick people
a treatment option.

AUSTIN ­ Doctors, nurses and victims of chronic illness urged lawmakers
Tuesday to give them the legal cover to use marijuana to relieve pain and
suffering.

The House Criminal Jurisprudence Committee debated whether to provide an
automatic defense to possession of marijuana if a physician recommended its
use for a medical condition.

Opponents argued that doctors can prescribe a pill that contains the main
chemical element of marijuana and that the bill could serve as an opening
for legalizing the drug.

Bill author Rep. Terry Keel, R-Austin, a former prosecutor and Travis
County sheriff, said his proposal would not legalize marijuana but serve as
a "careful, prudent step" to give those suffering from disease one more
treatment.

Under the bill, which appeared to have the support of a majority of
committee members, those arrested on marijuana possession charges could
argue in court that they were suffering from a serious ailment.

They would need a medical doctor's support. If the court believed their
evidence, the offenders would be found not guilty.

Mr. Keel said he polled almost 10,000 constituents in his conservative
district and found they heavily favored the proposal.

He said some colleagues expressed shock that he had filed the bill, but
none of the prosecutors or police officers he had worked with was surprised.

Those in law enforcement already use some discretion in dismissing medical
marijuana cases they might encounter, but this bill provides direction for
those who do not, Mr. Keel said.

"If a police officer would arrest someone who falls under the circumstances
I described, they don't have enough to do," he said.

Rep. Robert E. Talton, R-Pasadena, said he thinks the bill is backed by,
"what appears to me as a movement to legalize marijuana."

He said that the federal Drug Enforcement Administration does not think
there is a valid medicinal benefit from smoking marijuana.

Dr. Dick Evans, director of the Texas Cancer Center in Houston, said there
are numerous benefits from inhaled marijuana for those undergoing
chemotherapy or suffering from AIDS, terminal cancer, muscle spasms,
paralysis, glaucoma and chronic pain.

He cited a national survey of oncologists where 44 percent said they would
recommend marijuana to patients.

"Sick Texans deserve better treatment," he said.

Dr. Alan Robison, distinguished professor of pharmacology at the University
of Texas Health Science Center and MD Anderson Cancer Center in Houston,
said that marijuana in pill form is hard for many patients to ingest.

He also said Marinol is erratically absorbed in bloodstreams and "it is
invariably toxic. In other words, the patients get high. It is an
irritating side effect."

With a few puffs of a marijuana cigarette, the effect is immediate and
controlled so that the bad symptoms dissipate but the side effects are not
evident.

Committee members said they would review studies by medical institutions
and the DEA before voting on the bill in the next few weeks.