MEDICAL MARIJUANA CARD WILL COST $150 PER YEAR

The Oregon Health Division Approves The Fee To Help Pay The Costs Of
Administering The Program For Those Who Have A Certified Need For The
Drug

People who smoke marijuana to ease their pain and nausea will have to
pay $150 a year for an Oregon registration card. The cards exempt
medicinal marijuana users and their helpers from state laws against
owning and raising marijuana.

The fee, approved this week by the Oregon Health Division, is part of
the bureaucratic machinery to implement a law passed by voters in
November allowing seriously ill people to use marijuana. The Health
Division's registration process goes into effect today.

However, Oregonians have been able to use marijuana for medicinal
purposes since December without fear of violating state law, even
without a card.

The fee will generate $75,000 if 500 marijuana users sign up -- the
number that health officials estimate will take advantage of the
program at any one time. But that's still short of the amount needed
to fully finance the program's $105,000 annual budget. The budget
includes financing for a full-time employee to run the program.

Dr. Grant Higginson, Oregon state health officer, said that in case of
a shortfall, the Health Division will have to absorb the additional
cost. He said it's hard to estimate the costs and number of people who
will participate because no state has ever administered a medical
marijuana program before. Medical marijuana is legal under California
law, but the state doesn't register participants.

Kelly Paige, coordinator of the Health Division's Medical Marijuana
Program, said her office had received 105 requests for registration
cards that grant immunity from state laws against using the drug.

Under the law, people who have certain debilitating medical
conditions, including cancer, AIDS, glaucoma, seizures, pain and
nausea, can use marijuana to ease their discomfort.

The law works like this: The patient must fill out an application to
participate in the program. The patient's attending physician must
complete a separate form specifying that marijuana might mitigate the
patient's symptoms. The application must include a copy of the
patient's photo identification, such as an Oregon driver's license.

If the patient plans to use a helper to cultivate marijuana, the
helper also must supply identification and receive a card.

The information is sent to the Health Division along with the $150
fee.

The Health Division sends registration cards to both the patient and
the patient's helper, if the patient needs one.

The cards exempt both the patient and the helper from state laws
prohibiting the possession and cultivation of marijuana. Possession
and cultivation are still violations of federal drug laws, however.

Under Oregon law, the patient cannot possess more than a total of
three mature marijuana plants, four immature plants and 1 ounce of
usable marijuana for each plant.

The law doesn't specify how a patient is supposed to obtain marijuana
seeds for planting. Sale of marijuana is still illegal under both
state and federal law. But proponents of the measure have said they
expect that people who previously used marijuana illegally will give
seeds or young plants to new patients free of charge.

Dr. Rick Bayer, a Lake Oswego resident and principal sponsor of the
measure, said he thinks the Health Division "has tried to be very
fair" in writing the regulations.

"They have to charge a fee to cover the cost of the program," he
said.

Bayer said people who know how to grow marijuana have told him that
under limitations imposed by the law, a program participant could
harvest up to 3 ounces during one three-month growing cycle from
plants grown indoors.

But he said that quantity might not be enough for some patients,
particularly if they use a new vaporizing technique instead of smoking
marijuana in a hand-rolled cigarette.

Vaporizors heat marijuana to about 190 centigrade, a point at which
the active cannabinoid substances are released into the air. He said
the advantages of vaporizers are that they don't cause the marijuana
to burn. Inhaling smoke is more irritating to lung and bronchial
tissue than the cannabinoid vapors themselves, he said.

"I think it would be more healthy than inhaling the smoke, but I don't
have any data to support that," Bayer said.

The drawback is that the technique uses three to four times as much
marijuana by weight to have the same therapeutic effect as smoking a
marijuana cigarette, he said.

Depending on its success, Bayer said, the new technique might prompt
lawmakers to consider increasing the amount of usable marijuana that a
patient can keep.

Meanwhile, Oregon legislators are considering a bill that would
eliminate the so-called "affirmative defense" aspect of the law. In
its present form, the law doesn't specifically require medicinal
marijuana users to obtain a state permit to possess the drug. Instead,
the law permits marijuana users who are arrested to raise medical
necessity as a defense in court, even though they haven't applied for
a permit.

Oregon law enforcement officers have argued that the law is virtually
impossible to enforce because of that feature.

At the request of the Oregon Association of Chiefs of Police, Rep.
Kevin Mannix, R-Salem, has introduced House Bill 3052, which would
remove the affirmative defense provision of the law.

Mannix's bill also would eliminate a requirement that law enforcement
officers return marijuana seized from people who are authorized to
possess it under the act. The measure is in the House Judiciary Committee.