NATIONAL ACADEMY OF SCIENCES REPORT SUPPORTS MEDICAL USE OF MARIJUANA

Mar. 18--LOS ANGELES--A study commissioned by the government offers
scientific evidence that supports what advocates of medical marijuana
have said for years: Marijuana can be effective in treating pain for
some terminally ill patients and legalizing it for medicinal use would
not lead to widespread abuse.

In issuing the report Wednesday, the National Academy of Sciences'
Institute of Medicine contradicted U.S. drug policy director Barry
McCaffrey's repeated assertions that "not a shred of scientific
evidence" exists to support medical marijuana and that legalizing it
would send the wrong message to young people.

McCaffrey had called for the study in early 1997 after California
voters approved a ballot measure that legalized marijuana for some
medical purposes. Since then, McCaffrey has sought unsuccessfully to
defeat similar initiatives in Alaska, Arizona, Nevada, Oregon and
Washington. He said the study would help him base future policies on
science and remove politics from the debate.

At a news conference Wednesday in South-Central Los Angeles, McCaffrey
praised the study as "the most comprehensive analysis of medical
marijuana ever done" and supported its conclusions.

He urged the National Institute of Health and the Food and Drug
Administration to conduct clinical studies on marijuana and pressed
pharmaceutical companies to develop alternatives to smoking, such as
inhalers, patches and suppositories, that could deliver to patients
the active ingredients in marijuana more safely.

But whether the study will spur policy changes or simply add fuel to
the political controversy is uncertain.

A 1980s federal study of marijuana led to the development of a pill,
called Marinol, that uses the active ingredients of marijuana. But
McCaffrey said studying marijuana generally is a low priority for the
federal agencies and that pharmaceutical firms have little interest in
working with it.

"I want the National Institute of Health to look carefully and
respectfully at the findings. What we will aggressively support is
continued research," McCaffrey said. He noted that developing a new
drug generally takes 10 years and costs $200 million to $300 million.
"Our experience is that there is little commercial interest for this
drug," he said.

The 290-page study, called "Marijuana and Medicine: Assessing the Science
Base," was quickly attacked by opponents of medical marijuana.

Robert Maginnis, director for national security and foreign affairs
for the Family Research Council, said, "Marijuana legalizers are
making serious gains across America by using the issue of `medical'
marijuana and the vehicle of compassion to buy sympathy votes...

"Sick and dying people do not need marijuana," Maginnis said. "They
need good medicine, which our doctors have available for every ailment
marijuana allegedly helps."

Advocates for medical marijuana said the study may help efforts to
reclassify marijuana from a Schedule 1 to a Schedule 2 drug. The
government considers Schedule 1 drugs to be dangerous and to have no
medical benefits, making them extremely difficult to obtain for research.

"This report undermines the claims that marijuana is dangerous and has
no medical value," said Bill Zimmerman, executive director of
Americans for Medical Rights and author of the book "Is Marijuana the
Right Medicine for You?"

"The report will launch legal efforts and political efforts.
Government agencies, medical schools and Congress will debate this,"
Zimmerman added. "There will be mounting pressure on the Clinton
administration to reschedule (marijuana)."

Rep. Barney Frank (D-Mass.) already has introduced a bill that would
eliminate some of the hurdles for researchers.

The report suggests that marijuana can be effective for people
suffering from chemotherapy-induced nausea and AIDS-induced weight
loss. Balancing those benefits, researchers said, are disorientation
and other unpleasant psychological effects for some patients,
particularly older people. The researchers acknowledge that users can
become dependent on marijuana, but less so than for cocaine, opiates
or nicotine.

As with tobacco, smoking marijuana can cause cancer, lung damage and
low-birthweight babies for pregnant women, the report noted.

"We see little future in smoked marijuana for medical use," said Dr.
John A. Benson Jr., dean of the Oregon Health Sciences University's
school of medicine and author of the study. "The goal ... is to
develop safe delivery systems from the compounds found in marijuana."

Since development of such methods would take years, the report said
that under certain restrictions smoked marijuana still could provide
relief for terminally ill patients with debilitating conditions who
have found little help from other medications. Use of smoked marijuana
should be monitored closely by a physician and limited to six months
or less.

Contrary to popular practice, the study said, marijuana should not be
used to treat glaucoma. It concluded that glaucoma patients can derive
only short-term benefits from smoking marijuana, gains that are not
worth the problems associated with long-term use.

While marijuana may help relieve muscle spasms associated with
multiple sclerosis, the report asserted that marijuana does little for
patients suffering from Huntington's and Parkinson's diseases.

The report discounted arguments that marijuana is a so-called
"gateway" drug, leading to harder drugs. "There is no conclusive
evidence that drug effects of marijuana are causally linked to the
subsequent abuse of other illicit drugs," the report said. "It does
not follow from those data that if marijuana were available by
prescription for medical use, the pattern of drug use would remain the
same as seen in illicit use."

As for suggestions that legalizing medicinal marijuana would lead to
widespread abuse of marijuana, the report said: "At this point, there
are no convincing data to support this concern. The existing data are
consistent with the idea that this would not be a problem if the
medical use of marijuana were as closely regulated as other
medications with abuse potential."

Keith Vines, a prosecutor in San Francisco who has been smoking
medicinal marijuana to help restore his appetite lost from AIDS, said
he supports further clinical study. "But in the meantime the federal
government should speed the process to allow (patients) to smoke it in
a controlled way."