RESTRICTIONS EASED FOR RESEARCH ON MEDICAL MARIJUANA

WASHINGTON - Responding to pressure from scientists and voters, the Clinton
administration loosened restraints Friday on medical marijuana
research. The move is expected to prompt more studies to see if the
drug helps people with AIDS, cancer or eye disease.

Scientists with private grants will now be able to get legal marijuana
from the government's supply -- grown on a small plot of land in
Mississippi to make sure it's all the same strength.

Previously, only scientists who had won federal grants had access to
that marijuana. And only a few such federal studies have been approved.

"We all thought the time was right" for the new guidelines, said
Steven Gust, a special assistant to the director of the National
Institute on Drug Abuse, part of the National Institutes of Health.

The White House Office on National Drug Control Policy, headed by
Barry McCaffrey, favors marijuana studies "as long as they pass a peer
review process to make sure the research is good science," said
Charles Blanchard, the office's chief counsel.

McCaffrey has opposed actions by states to permit medical uses of
marijuana, claiming that would prejudge serious scientific research.

Experts found in two recent reports that marijuana for some patients
is effective in relieving pain, nausea and vomiting caused by cancer
and AIDS. Some glaucoma patients also smoke the drug to help relieve
pressure inside the eye.

Under the new guidelines, privately funded researchers conducting
"scientifically valid investigations" reviewed and approved by the
National Institutes of Health will be allowed to purchase the
government marijuana.

Many cancer, AIDS and glaucoma patients already use marijuana, often
bought illegally on the street. At least six states have passed
measures to permit the drug's medicinal use if prescribed by a physician.

Federal law, however, bans the drug. And many doctors are reluctant to
approve it for their patients because of the controversy over its benefits.

The tough federal stance on medical marijuana prompted some doctors in
California to get a court injunction to block what they feared would
be federal reprisals for prescribing marijuana to patients under that
state's compassionate-use laws.