U.S.-FUNDED "EXPERT" BRINGS REEFER MADNESS TO BRAZIL

Sao Paulo Newspaper Claims that Marijuana Causes "Insomnia, Nausea,
Muscular Pain," and "Loss of Appetite"

RIO DE JANEIRO, BRAZIL: As the country of Brazil moves closer to more
humane and democratic drug policy, the vested interests - led by the "drug
treatment" lobby - are trying desperately to pull it back to the Stone Age.
The spear used by these Neanderthals of drug policy comes in the form of
knowingly false statements about marijuana users and efforts to corral them
into "treatment."

Even as hundreds of drug war critics met in Rio de Janeiro at the event
co-sponsored by Narco News last Friday, a U.S. government-funded advocate
of "marijuana treatment" had arrived in Sao Paulo to promote his fledgling
industry: "Treatment" for marijuana smokers.

Among the demonstrably false claims made the sponsors of the forum titled
"Advances in the Treatment of Marijuana Users" at the Federal University of
Sao Paulo (Unifesp) were, according to the daily O Estado of Sao Paulo,
that the use of marijuana causes "insomnia, nausea, muscular pain, anxiety,
nervousness, sweat, diarrhea, loss of appetite and intense desire to use
the drug."

These bizarre claims about marijuana already don't fly in the United
States, where they were made for years by the snake-oil salesmen of
prohibition and later discarded after being thoroughly disproved by medical
journals and professionals. In fact, the claims made in Brazil this week of
insomnia, loss of appetite, and muscular pain, supposedly caused by
marijuana use, are directly opposite to the consensus of doctors,
investigators, and public health professionals in the U.S. and elsewhere
who prescribe marijuana as an effective medicine to provide relief for
those ailments.

The true facts - and the brazenness with which the Drug Treatment Lobby is
lying about them in Brazil - makes the presence of professor Robert
Stephens of the Virginia Polytechnic Institute as the special invitee of
the Sao Paulo forum (he's with a group that calls itself the "Marijuana
Treatment Project") a matter that should be scrutinized by U.S. taxpayers
and Brazilian Civil Society alike.

The article in Friday's daily O Estado, authored by someone named Renato
Lombardi, also promoted "the effectiveness of brief treatment for users" of
marijuana, and "the first out-patient clinic aimed at dependents of
marijuana," a clinic that is apparently - says the newspaper - looking for
potheads to give them "treatment."

Where There's Smoke There Are Facts

The claims made this week by the marijuana treatment lobby in Brazil have
been thoroughly refuted by serious medical journals and health
professionals in the U.S., Europe, Australia, and the rest of the world,
who have consistently stated:

* Marijuana is recognized, in serious medical practice, as a sedative, not
a stimulant, which means that it induces, not impedes, sleep among its users.

* Marijuana is an effective medicine against nausea, particularly for
cancer patients who suffer the nausea of chemotherapy or radiation therapy,
for AIDS patients who take nausea-inducing legal pharmaceuticals, and for
potheads everywhere who report they get the "munchies," or cravings for
food, after smoking the prohibited weed.

* Marijuana is an effective medicine to combat muscle spasms, relaxing the
pained muscles of patients suffering from multiple sclerosis and serious
physical injuries.

* Marijuana is a calming medicine, not an anxiety or nerve-wracking drug.

* Marijuana stimulates appetite (what pot users call "the munchies," in
which smoking the plant provokes a craving for food).

The "Reefer Madness" craze of the 1930s - the dishonest publicity campaign
of films and yellow journalism to frighten the U.S. populace that marijuana
use would cause Mexicans and blacks to rape their daughters and become
homicidal fiends, as prelude to the marijuana prohibition passed in 1937 -
is being resurrected in Brazil as a last-ditch desperate US-sponsored
effort to scare concerned parents south of the Equator into opposing the
drug policy reforms underway.

Worse, these surreal scare tactics are also being used to promote an
industry - the Drug Treatment Lobby - and, in particular, its fledgling
promotion of "marijuana treatment" services.

What motive, kind reader, could anyone have to state the exact opposite of
these indisputable facts, at this moment in history in Brazil?

As Homer Simpson might say: "Doh!"

The Simpsonization of the Drug War

It has not been a good early 21st century for our visiting "expert," Robert
Stephens, and his campaign to push "marijuana treatment" in the United
States. No wonder he's now importing it to Brazil. Perhaps he miscalculated
that he would get less scrutiny here.

Stephens was a co-author of the 2002 report "Cognitive functioning of
long-term heavy cannabis users seeking treatment" in the Journal of the
American Medical Association (JAMA). So far, so good, for professor
Stephens: an byline published by the prestigious JAMA ought to be a gold
star on anyone's career-- but wait--

As noted at the time by Alcohol and Drug Abuse Weekly, the Journal of the
American Medical Association refuted Stephens' report in the very same
issue of JAMA: "In an accompanying editorial to the study, Harrison G.
Pope, Jr., M.D., of the Biological Psychiatry Laboratory at Harvard
University affiliated McLean Hospital in Belmont, Mass., wrote that the
study findings must be viewed in conjunction with results from other
studies. Pope said that a prior study found no significant cognitive
deficits in seven of eight neuropsychological ability areas for long-term
marijuana users."

Harvard's Doctor Pope further pointed out - in the accompanying JAMA
editorial - that Stephens and Company "did not take into account the notion
that some of these people might possess anxiety or depressive disorders, or
used prescription drugs that might have caused the impairment. Forty-seven
percent of the heavy marijuana users in the study possessed a history of
regular use or dependence on other drugs, a fact that was not factored into
the study analysis, said Pope," according to Alcoholism and Drug Abuse
Weekly. "Pope also said that the researchers did not adjust for the gender
of study participants, and only partially adjusted their analysis to
reflect the age of participants."

Stephens and Company wrote nasty letters back to JAMA refuting Pope's
refutations, but the "harm reduction" of truth against lies had already
inoculated American medicine against Stephens' snake oil. (Whether
Stephens' Marijuana Treatment Project's titanic crash in the waters of JAMA
will impact future funding by the US government's Center for Substance
Abuse Control - this U.S. Health and Human Services Department agency doles
out, according to the department's own 1999 report, $1.4 billion dollars a
year in block grants - remains to be seen. Not that the U.S. government has
ever let the facts get in the way of a good drug war promotional campaign.)

Now, the promoter of the Marijuana Treatment Project has come to Brazil
with his bizarre campaign to "treat" marijuana users.

In a May 17, 2002, Seattle Times column co-authored by Roger A. Roffman,
Stephens relied on a world renowned authority to forward his campaign to
lasso marijuana users into "treatment": Homer Simpson. (No, kind reader,
Jayson Blair and Howell Raines have not joined the Narco News staff; we are
not making this up.) The Stephens and Roffman column was titled "Did Homer
Go to Pot?"

Stephens and Roffman wrote:

"A recent episode of the popular TV show 'The Simpsons' highlighted the
pros and cons of marijuana use, and Homer Simpson's experiences with
marijuana provide an example of what we mean."

- - Warning: Continued reading of Stephens' prose may cause, for some kind
readers, a hallucinogenic experience, provoking uncontrollable laughter. Do
not drink water or other liquids while reading the following paragraphs
because the beverage is likely to go up and out your nose, splashing your
laptop's keypad, and causing an electrical short circuit that could damage
your computer's hard drive.

Here are some excerpts from Stephens' scholarly discourse that extrapolates
the experience of a non-existent cartoon character, Homer Simpson, to make
broad assumptions about real-life pot smokers:

"After a run-in with some angry crows, Homer was prescribed medicinal
marijuana for the pain from eye injuries. In addition to the pain relief,
Homer found himself having an enhanced appreciation for music, food and a
variety of sensory experiences as a result of his marijuana use. He became
more relaxed and enjoyed life in ways he hadn't before... .

"Homer became preoccupied with smoking marijuana and some not-so-positive
effects showed up. He spent more time with other users and less with his
family. His friends thought that he was too "spacey" and noticed a change
in his personality. Yet, Homer continued to function reasonably well at
work and was actually liked better by some people.

"Eventually, problems with memory and attention became evident when Homer
and other marijuana users lost track of the date and scheduled a
pro-marijuana rally the day after an important vote was taken on whether
medicinal marijuana should be legal. Perhaps a bit exaggerated, but clearly
there are costs of marijuana use similar to these that are experienced by
real-life users."

Stephens and Roffman then give us a glimpse of their attitudes and
strategies about how to discuss marijuana use:

"It shouldn't surprise us that there is a positive side to marijuana use.
After all, why else would people smoke it? It's also not surprising that
drug education usually emphasizes the negative effects. Some believe that
talking too much about the positive effects might encourage more people to
start using and lead to more negative effects in the long run."

Then they invite the reader to consume their product, something called "The
Marijuana Check-Up," which, we learn, is funded by the United States
government:

"We see many adult marijuana users who are conflicted about the costs and
benefits of marijuana use and the pros and cons of quitting or reducing
use. We see them as participants in a research project at the University of
Washington financed by the National Institute on Drug Abuse. To date, 129
people have joined the project, called The Marijuana Check-Up."

That's 129 marijuana smokers... plus Homer Simpson... that Stephens' cites
to document his claims and give birth to the Marijuana Treatment Industry.

Meanwhile, in a country called Brazil...

On the Prowl for Potheads

Commercial Media attempts to induce public hysteria over drug use at this
historic moment in Brazil paint a scene out of film noir, as Authentic
Journalist Karine Muller noted on these pages last March, are reaching a
fevered pitch. Now, Renato Lombardi of O Estado has added his pen to the
service of the disinformation.

"Brazil Is One of Two Major Marijuana Consumers," is the headline. The
subhead invites you to the show: "Meeting Unites Specialists to Discuss
Advances in Drug Treatment."

Brazil is, in fact, one of the two big pot-smoking countries, although
still dwarfed by consumption inside the United States, in spite of
professor Stephens' "marijuana treatment" industry. But unlike the U.S.,
Brazil does not export maconha to other countries. "The marijuana grown in
Brazil is consumed in Brazil," noted union leader Eraldo Jose de Souza at
Friday's Civil Society forum in Rio de Janeiro. (The fact that Brazil does
not export marijuana, or any drug, to the United States also raises the
question: What the hell is the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA)
doing in Brazil? That question will be addressed in a future Narco News
report.)

The O Estado article by Renato Lombardi begins with a single true statement
- - that Brazil is number-two in the World Cup of pot smoking - but
immediately deteriorates into mythology. We are told that, according to a
United Nations study, "street children are those who experiment most" with
marijuana. We are told that another study (the names of and details of
these studies are not cited) "reveals that 26 percent" of university
students in Sao Paulo, use marijuana, and that among "first and second
grade students, four percent admit that they have experimented with
marijuana at least once."

O Estado continues:

"In a work prepared about marijuana, the psychiatrist Ronaldo Laranjeira,
of the Federal University of Sao Paulo, reveals that the drug provokes
dependency and causes damages to health. 'The person feels insomnia,
nausea, muscular pain, anxiety, nervousness, sweat, diarrhea, loss of
appetite, and intense desire to use the drug,' says Laranjeira."

And the newspaper informs us that Laranjeira will be the host of last
Friday's forum, with the Alcohol and Drugs Studies Unit (UNIAD, in its
Portuguese acronym) at the Federal University, featuring the same
Laranjeira and "six other major Brazilian specialists in the issue."

The Guest of Honor for this homage to alleged "advances" in "marijuana
treatment," is the expert from out of town: Professor Robert Stephens, who
"wrote articles about marijuana treatment and will speak about the
Marijuana Treatment Project (MTP), an American multidisciplinary study to
test the effectiveness of brief treatments for users of the drug. Stephens
is the creator of a school for problems with marijuana."

Get it, kind readers: Stephens has a "project" and a "school" but is also
presented as someone who "tests the effectiveness" of his own projects!

O Estado's Renato Lombardi then informs us that the UNAID program at the
university "created, in 2000, the first out-patient clinic aimed at those
dependent on marijuana, separate from those that serve dependents of
cocaine and alcohol."

In explaining the differences between marijuana "dependents" and other drug
users, Flavia Jungerman, coordinator of the out-patient clinic, is quoted
as saying, "It would be difficult for a marijuana dependent to rob a car to
buy the drug, as is common among those dependent on cocaine." And,
according to her, "the marijuana consumer does poorly in school, doesn't
find work, and has difficulty concentrating." (This, from the same report
that tells us the 26 percent of local university students - that is, people
who did well enough in school to get into college - smoke grass!)

Apparently, according to Lombardi of O Estado, the Brazil program is only
somewhat more popular than Stephens' U.S. program and its 129 patients:
Since its inauguration in 2000, the Brazil clinic has attracted "more than
300 patients." That would be around ten a month.

But the most dangerous harm that we can find to these marijuana smokers is
also cited in this article: That 44 percent of the patients "treated" for
marijuana use "had some contact with the police."

So, as a U.S. expert and his dishonest allies in Sao Paulo promote their
"Marijuana Treatment" Industry, we are back to square one: The real problem
with marijuana is that it is illegal, and bringing, according to its own
self-appointed purveyors of "treatment," four out of nine users "in contact
with the police."

As Judge Maria Lucia Karam, presiding at the standing-room only forum in
Rio de Janeiro last Friday, declared in her verdict, there is a crime being
committed and guilt to be found. "The State," she declared, "is guilty."

And one of the guilty party's main accomplices is the Drug Treatment Lobby,
addicted to government funds to carry out its terrorism called "therapeutic
justice," a terror Made in the USA, now with its start-up division of
"marijuana treatment," being exported, like other defective products that
no longer enjoy consumer confidence in the United States, to Brazil.