MEDICAL MARIJUANA FACES TEST AT POLLS

PORTLAND, Ore. - A state-by-state strategy for legalizing marijuana to treat
certain medical ailments gets its first big test next Tuesday as voters in
four states confront closely watched ballot measures.

To supporters, medical marijuana is a matter of compassion for sick and
dying patients who can't seem to find pain relief anywhere else. But, to
opponents, it's a dangerous step toward legalization of all drugs.

''The issue is that dying and suffering patients should not be arrested
when, under their doctor's supervision, they use marijuana as medicine,''
says Rick Bayer, a Portland physician leading the campaign here for Oregon's
Measure 67.

But Donald Vereen, a physician and deputy director the White House Office of
National Drug Control Policy, says the decision should be left up to federal
health officials. ''We don't want something determined to be medicine,'' he
says, ''because a bunch of people voted on it.''

Voters in Alaska, Nevada and Washington state, as well as in Oregon, will
consider ballot initiatives that list what illnesses marijuana can be used
to treat, including cancer, AIDS, glaucoma, multiple sclerosis, chronic pain
and nausea.

In each state, doctors would be allowed to recommend marijuana, and patients
would be protected from criminal prosecution. In Alaska, Oregon and Nevada,
state officials are to establish a state ID card so police can easily
identify legal users. The amounts a patient could legally possess would vary
from one ounce plus three mature plants in Alaska to a 60-day supply in
Washington state.

A similar measure will appear on ballots in Colorado and Washington, D.C.,
but the results will not count. A judge in Colorado ruled that the
initiative did not attract sufficient signatures. And Congress amended the
District of Columbia's budget last week to forbid the use of public funds in
certifying the results.

Vereen dismisses as anecdotal the arguments of supporters that many people
find relief for their chronic pain only through marijuana. Arguments for
medical marijuana are often ''fluffy and pull on your heartstrings,'' he
says. ''You would think it's the magic bullet. People may be asking for
compassionate care, but that's what medicine does every day.''

Law enforcement groups also oppose legalization measures. They say it sends
the wrong message to children during the nation's war on drugs.

Under federal law, marijuana is classified as a dangerous drug like heroin
with no medical value. Unlike cocaine, amphetamines, or morphine, physicians
are not allowed to prescribe it. That's why the proposed state laws all say
doctors may ''recommend'' it.

The Clinton administration maintains that there have been insufficient
studies to determine the safety and effectiveness of smoked marijuana. But
Bayer says that there have been many studies documenting its value.

''The so-called lack of science is either ignorance or a smokescreen,'' he
says. ''I'm not saying marijuana is safe. I'm saying marijuana safety has to
be taken into context,'' and compared with less effective painkillers.

California and Arizona approved the use of medical marijuana two years ago,
although neither state government has embraced it and the federal government
has bitterly fought its use. The Arizona law was gutted by the state
Legislature and voters will consider overriding lawmakers next week.

In California, Attorney General Dan Lungren and federal officials have
succeeded in persuading judges to close buyers' clubs that supplied patients
with pot. But supporters of medical marijuana say courts have not stopped
perhaps as many as 100,000 California patients from legally growing their
own.

The surge of interest in these laws ''started the day after the election in
1996,'' political consultant Bill Zimmerman says. He was manager of the 1996
campaign in California and is director of Americans for Medical Rights, the
umbrella group coordinating most but not all of this year's initiatives.

With little immediate hope for change by the federal government, the group
is seeking ''to go state by state to bring pressure to bear on future
congresses and a future president,'' Zimmerman says. The goal is to get the
federal government to reclassify marijuana so it can be used as medicine by
2002 or 2003.

Zimmerman's group will spend about $2 million nationwide this year, he says.
This includes paying for TV ads. Meanwhile, the federal government has
launched recently a $195-million-a-year, five-year advertising campaign that
includes anti-marijuana messages.

Americans for Medical Rights is financed mainly by philanthropist George
Soros of New York; John Sperling, founder of the for-profit University of
Phoenix; and insurance executive Peter Lewis of Cleveland. Proponents all
support reforming the nation's drug laws, but only some favor legalizing
marijuana.

The money behind the campaign also has provided ammunition for Barry
McCaffrey, head of the White House drug policy office. This summer he
blasted Zimmerman's group as a ''carefully camouflaged, exorbitantly funded,
well-heeled, elitist group whose ultimate goal is to legalize drug use'' in
the USA.

By

Checked-by: Don Beck