MARIJUANA, AIDS RESEARCHER SEEKS ISLE APPLICANTS

He praises Cayetano for backing a bill to allow medical marijuana

The doctor who is beginning the first U.S. study of the effects of marijuana
on AIDS patients said San Francisco doctors treating HIV-positive victims
"know so many of our patients smoke, we need to know if it's helpful or
harmful." Dr. Donald Abrams' planned research project will focus on the
safety of medical marijuana use. He described it Thursday to a group of 35
Honolulu physicians who treat AIDS victims, and yesterday at the Honolulu
Medical Group. "AIDS patients in San Francisco have long told us that
marijuana is good medicine," said Abrams, assistant director of the San
Francisco General Hospital AIDS program and a professor of clinical medicine
at the University of California in San Francisco. He was involved in early
research into the effects of AIDS and treatments. He praised Gov. Ben
Cayetano, who has said he will back a bill to permit marijuana use under a
doctor's supervision. "Perhaps Hawaii can pass rational legislation that the
rest of the country can follow." Voters in six other states have approved
ballot initiatives legalizing medical marijuana use. But implementation has
been thwarted -- by Arizona's Legislature, by Colorado's state
administration and, in California, by state and federal enforcement
agencies, which shut down dispensaries permitted by local San Francisco
authorities. A total of 64 subjects are being sought for the research
project, which will seek information on marijuana in combination with
virus-suppressing medication taken by AIDS patients.

It also will look at marijuana's effect on appetite, energy, weight and body
composition. Hawaii applicants would be welcome, he said. A subject must be
an AIDS patient who is taking protease inhibitors and has previously used
marijuana "so they know what to expect." Interested persons should call
(415) 502-5705. The participants will be paid $1,000 to stay in the hospital
for 25 days. Some will smoke three marijuana cigarettes per day; others will
take a pill containing synthetic THC, marijuana's primary active ingredient;
and others will take a placebo. "In a year we'll actually have some facts
instead of anecdotes," said Dr. David McEwan of Honolulu, founder of the
Life Foundation. "People tell us what they hear from others.

We really need to know if this works," said Dr. Brian Issell, director of
the Cancer Research Center of Hawaii and a University of Hawaii professor of
medicine. "Does it help and who does it help -- I really hope we can find
out." Abrams said the Food and Drug Administration approved his study in
1994, the year he proposed it, but he was thwarted by the National Institute
on Drug Abuse, which controls the legal supply of marijuana for research.
After reconfiguring the scope of the research project, he finally got a
grant from the National Institutes of Health. "The government gave us $1
million and 1,400 joints," he said, in a humorous punch line to his
chronicle of years of government roadblocks to the research.