PRIVATE RESEARCH TO PARTAKE OF U.S. POT

Medicine: Government Marijuana Crop Opened To NIH-Approved Study.

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 W.
Gust, a special assistant to the director of the National Institute on Drug
Abuse, part of the National Institutes of Health.

The new guidelines were created after Cabinet-level discussions among
agencies including the Department of Health and Human Services, the Justice
Department, the Drug Enforcement Administration and the White House Office
of National Drug Control Policy, Gust said.

The drug-control office, 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,
saying that would prejudge serious scientific research. Two recent reports
recommended more research on marijuana, citing possible benefits to some
patients.

Under the new guidelines, privately funded researchers conducting
NIH-approved studies 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, including California by
initiative, have passed measures to permit the drug's medicinal use if
prescribed by a physician.

Federal law, however, bans the drug.