LOCAL NONPROFIT, OTHERS SENSE MOMENTUM FOR MEDICINAL CANNIBIS

To help battle pain and other problems caused by his debilitating
bone disease, Irv Rosenfeld used to take multiple daily doses of at
least eight prescription medications, including strong pain pills
Dilaudid and Percocet.

Rosenfeld no longer takes any of those medications to curb the
effects of his disease, multiple congenital cartilaginous exostoses.

Nowadays, the Florida-based stock broker, who routinely takes
disabled children sailing and plays softball, relies on just one
medication: Cannabis sativa, commonly known as marijuana.

"Without cannabis, most likely I would be homebound and on
disability. That's if I was alive," Rosenfeld said this week in a
phone interview. "It has literally made my life bearable."

Rosenfeld is one of just four participants grandfathered into the now
closed federal Compassionate Investigational New Drug program.

The 56-year-old has been in the program nearly 30 years, during which
time he has continued to push for cannabis to be legalized for medicinal use.

Rosenfeld is not alone, as there has been a surge in recent months by
pro-medicinal cannabis activists pushing for changes in law.

One local activist group, Patients Out of Time, for years has been at
the forefront of the fight to make cannabis legal medicinally.

Based in Nelson County, just across the Albemarle line, POT is run by
Al Byrne and Mary Lynn Mathre, and Rosenfeld is on the group's board
of directors.

They think that, with a presidential administration that appears to
be open to their cause, now is the time to win the fight to make
cannabis a legal medication -- and they believe the change can come
at the federal level. Yet there are still many activists and
government agencies that condemn marijuana as a dangerous drug that
should remain illegal.

When Byrne was a youngster, his father told him marijuana was evil
and his son believed it.

When Byrne was 22, his father was diagnosed as having liver cancer,
and eventually succumbed to the disease.

Chemotherapy treatments made his father deathly ill, and a doctor
told the younger Byrne to get his father marijuana.

After smoking marijuana, Byrne said, his father was able to eat and
hold the food down.

Byrne, a Navy veteran who is now 66, has been a believer in medical
marijuana ever since.

Experiences Lead to Activism

Mathre, who for two decades was an addiction specialist consultant
with the University of Virginia Health System, had similar
experiences as a Navy nurse who has seen patients treated with
medicinal marijuana. She has also written articles and books on
medicinal cannabis.

Both have testified in front of agencies and in court hearings in
favor of medicinal cannabis.

In the 1980s and '90s, Byrne and Mathre were on the board of the
National Organization for the Reform of Marijuana Laws.

In 1990, the couple helped to orchestrate a conference at which
several of the federal medicinal marijuana patients spoke. It was
covered live by C-SPAN.

Afterward, Byrne said, NORMAL was inundated with thousands of phone calls.

"And Mary Lynn and I realized we were onto something," he said.
"Patients were the key."

So the couple informally started their own activist group, which in
1995 officially became POT.

In 2000, the couple began hosting conferences touting the legitimacy
of medicinal cannabis research, something the federal government for
years has said didn't exist.

They have held three conferences. The last, in 2004, was held in
Charlottesville and co-sponsored by the Virginia Nurses Association,
the Pain Management Center and UVa's medical, law and nursing schools.

Byrne said he has made it a point over the years to stay in the
federal government's face on the issue.

He and Mathre now see real potential that the fight can be won.

Is Science Clear?

For more than 30 years, cannabis has remained a Schedule 1 drug,
meaning it is considered to have the highest potential for abuse;
there is no medically accepted use for it; and it is unsafe for use
under a doctor's supervision.

Byrne considers the government's stance absurd.

"The myth out there by the government and people who believe the
government is that [cannabis] hasn't been recognized as a medicine
yet," he said. "There is no logical explanation for the government's approach."

He said research has proven cannabis' medicinal value, noting a study
sponsored by POT in which four of the federal Compassionate
Investigational New Drug program patients were thoroughly tested and
the results showed that cannabis helped relieve their symptoms with
minimal side effects.

There also is the Center for Medical Cannabis Research at the
University of California, San Diego School of Medicine.

Researchers there have reported positive results of smoked marijuana
in HIV patients and in a study focused on alleviating nerve pain, for instance.

There is much more medicinal cannabis research being conducted worldwide.

But others are not convinced of cannabis' medicinal value or they
believe science can isolate the herb's medicinal properties and
thereby create a safe drug.

Steven Steiner, founder of Dads and Mad Moms Against Drug Dealers,
believes legalizing cannabis is a bad idea.

"My stance on marijuana is it is not a benign drug that people equate
it to be," he said. "It's a drug that intoxicates people who make bad choices."

He admits that cannabis seems to help some with their health
problems, but said science can, and has in the form of Sativex,
isolate marijuana's medicinal properties without the need to smoke it.

Sativex is a cannabinoid-based oral spray that was developed by
United Kingdom-based GW Pharmaceuticals, and it has been approved for
use by multiple sclerosis and cancer patients in Canada. It also is
currently undergoing late-stage studies in the UK and in the U.S.,
according to GW's web site.

Steiner believes pro-medicinal cannabis advocates are afraid of
Sativex, which he said could be "the nail in their coffin."

The Food and Drug Administration and the Drug Enforcement Agency also
are not convinced of cannabis' medicinal value.

The DEA Web site section on its stance concerning cannabis (last
updated in May 2006) clearly states that the department does not
believe marijuana has any medicinal value.

Indeed, the DEA describes marijuana as dangerous.

"Legalization of marijuana, no matter how it begins, will come at the
expense of our children and public safety," the site says. "It will
create dependency and treatment issues, and open the door to use of
other drugs, impaired health, delinquent behavior, and drugged drivers."

Mathre and Byrne believe the federal government for too long has used
propaganda and lies to keep cannabis illegal.

"This whole thing is ludicrous," said Mathre.

Still, Byrne believes it is only a matter of time before medicinal
cannabis is legal on the federal level.

"We're about to win here in the United States," he said. "We have the science."

A Long Fight Nearing End?

Recently, there appears to have been a shift in medical marijuana attitudes.

Legislation to make medicinal marijuana legal is pending in four
states. There are 13 states that have legalized medicinal marijuana.
(Virginia has a law, passed in 1979, that permits doctors and
pharmacists to prescribe marijuana to cancer and glaucoma patients,
but because marijuana is illegal federally, there is no legitimate
way for the drug to be prescribed.)In March, U.S. Attorney General
Eric H. Holder Jr. said the Justice Department would no longer raid
marijuana dispensaries that comply with state laws, a reversal from
the Bush administration.

Significant hurdles remain, however, and Jon Gettman knows this
better than most.

Gettman, the leader of the Coalition for Rescheduling Cannabis, has
filed petitions with the DEA to have cannabis rescheduled.

His original petition in 1995 was denied on a technicality. But he
refiled the petition in 2002.

The newer petition has stalled for years, but he said last week that
a decision could come sometime this year.

"It's alive and well," he said.

He said the petition relies on some 350 scientific research articles
and clearly spells out that cannabis should not be a Schedule 1 drug.

The ultimate decision will be made by the U.S. Department of Health
and Human Services, which currently is considering his petition, said
Gettman, a senior fellow at the George Mason University School of
Public Policy. He also teaches courses at three other universities
and is a writer, researcher and policy analyst.

"We do expect some movement in the near future," he said.

Yet, he acknowledges that with the Barack Obama administration stuck
in the long process of filling positions, there could be more delays
in a decision.

Either way, he is more confident in his case than in the past.

"We think we have a pretty good case," he said. "I'm confident in the
science and the law."

While marijuana is habit forming for some and has negative side
effects for others, Gettman said it is more comparable to Schedule 3
and 4 drugs, which are legal for medicinal purposes.

Like Gettman, Byrne and Mathre, Rosenfeld believes others will
eventually be allowed to do what he has been doing for nearly 30
years -- legally use medicinal cannabis.

"We will persevere," he said. "We will win. It's right."