• Cannabis & Hemp - Drug Policy - Hot Off The 'Net

    Pot Laws Ruled Unconstitutional

    An Ontario Superior Court judge has ruled that the federal medical marijuana program is unconstitutional, giving the government three months to fix the problem before pot is effectively legalized.

    In an April 11 ruling, Justice Donald Taliano found that doctors across the country have “massively boycotted” the medical marijuana program and largely refuse to sign off on forms giving sick people access to necessary medication.

    As a result, legitimately sick people cannot access medical marijuana through appropriate means and must resort to illegal actions.

    Doctors’ “overwhelming refusal to participate in the medicinal marijuana program completely undermines the effectiveness of the program,” the judge wrote in his ruling.

    “The effect of this blind delegation is that seriously ill people who need marijuana to treat their symptoms are branded criminals simply because they are unable to overcome the barriers to legal access put in place by the legislative scheme.”

    Taliano declared the program to be invalid, as well as the criminal laws prohibiting possession and production of cannabis. He suspended his ruling for three months, giving Ottawa until mid-July to fix the program or face the prospect of effectively legalizing possession and production of cannabis.

    Continues: http://www.mapinc.org/drugnews/v11/n241/a08.html

    Pubdate: Wed, 13 Apr 2011
    Source: Toronto Star (CN ON)
    Copyright: 2011 The Toronto Star
    Contact: [email protected]
    Website: http://www.thestar.com/
    Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/456
    Author: Jennifer Yang
    Referenced: The Decision http://mapinc.org/url/Q7Itqn7O
    Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/mjcn.htm (Cannabis – Canada)

  • Drug Policy - Question of the Week

    What is domestic surveillance?

    Drug Policy Question of the Week – 4-4-11

    As answered by Mary Jane Borden, Editor of Drug War Facts for the Drug Truth Network on 4-4-11. http://www.drugtruth.net/cms/node/3331

    Question of the Week What is domestic surveillance?

    In a 2003 report, the American Civil Liberties Union warned,

    “In recent years – in no small part as the result of the failed “war on drugs” – Fourth Amendment principles have been steadily eroding. … The courts have allowed for increased surveillance and searches ….”

    The Department of Defense defines “Electronic Surveillance” as,

    “Acquisition of a nonpublic communication by electronic means without the consent of a person who is a party to an electronic communication.”

    It calls “Domestic Activities” those

    “that take place within the United States that do not involve a significant connection with a foreign power, organization, or person.”

    and indicates, that

    “Information may be collected about a United States person who is reasonably believed to be engaged in international narcotics activities.”

    Illicit drugs are often smuggled from other countries.

    The American Constitution Society worries that

    “There has been a massive shift from surveillance and intelligence-gathering based on a factual predicate—such as specific information or a lead about a suspicious person or event—to surveillance and intelligence-gathering intended to obtain vast troves of data on millions of people.”

    The American Civil Liberties Union confirms that

    “Data companies collect information from courthouses and other public sources, as well as marketing data – sometimes including extremely personal information [concerning Americans]…”.

    Citing Senator Sam Ervin the chief author of the 1974 Privacy Act,

    “When the Government knows all of our secrets, we stand naked before official power. Stripped of our privacy, we lose our rights and privileges. The Bill of Rights then becomes just so many words.”

    These facts and others like them can be found in the Domestic Surveillance section of the Interdiction of Drugs and Military Participation Chapters of Drug War Facts at www.drugwarfacts.org.

  • Drug Policy - Question of the Week

    What is naloxone?

    Drug Policy Question of the Week – 3-26-11

    As answered by Mary Jane Borden, Editor of Drug War Facts for the Drug Truth Network on 3-26-11. http://www.drugtruth.net/cms/node/3320

    Question of the Week: What is naloxone?

    A Drug Profile for Naloxone HCl from the Arizona Department of Health Services describes the drug as a

    “narcotic (opioid) agonist” marketed under the name Narcan. Its adult dosages come in IV, intra-nasal, and continuous IV infusion forms. As an antidote to opioid overdose, Naloxone “Reverses respiratory depression secondary to narcotics.”

    According to a Drexel University Law Review article,

    “The drug “blocks the effects of opiates by binding to three types of opioid receptors in the central nervous system. It is standard practice for first responders to inject naloxone when summoned to the scene of drug overdose”

    A study in the Canadian Journal for Emergency Medicine, stated,

    “Respiratory depression, the primary cause of death in opioid overdose, is due to direct inhibition of the brainstem respiratory centre and decreased responsiveness to carbon dioxide.”

    “Heroin [an opioid] is particularly toxic because of high lipid solubility, which allows it to cross the blood–brain barrier within seconds and achieve high brain levels.

    “Naloxone is also lipid soluble and enters the brain rapidly. Reversal of respiratory depression is evident 3–4 minutes after IV and 5–6 minutes after subcutaneous administration.”

    According to a 2005 article in the Journal of Urban Health,

    “Naloxone precipitates acute withdrawal symptoms in opiate-dependent persons, but has no effect on nonopiate users; serious adverse effects are rare and naloxone has no abuse potential.”

    The report goes on to say,

    “Fatal heroin overdose has become a leading cause of death among injection drug users. Several recent feasibility studies have concluded that naloxone distribution programs for heroin injectors should be implemented to decrease heroin overdose deaths.”

    These facts and others like them can be found in the Naloxone section of the Methadone Maintenance & Buprenorphine Chapters of Drug War Facts at www.drugwarfacts.org.

  • Drug Policy - Hot Off The 'Net

    Drug Courts Are Not the Answer

    Drug Courts are Not the Answer finds that drug courts are an ineffective and inappropriate response to drug law violations. Many, all the way up to the Obama administration, consider the continued proliferation of drug courts to be a viable solution to the problem of mass arrests and incarceration of people who use drugs. Yet this report finds that drug courts do not reduce incarceration, do not improve public safety, and do not save money when compared to the wholly punitive model they seek to replace. The report calls for reducing the role of the criminal justice system in responding to drug use by expanding demonstrated health approaches, including harm reduction and drug treatment, and by working toward the removal of criminal penalties for drug use.

    Drug Courts Are Not the Answer: Toward a Health-Centered Approach to Drug Use. Drug Policy Alliance; March 2011.

  • Drug Policy - Question of the Week

    Can people with a drug conviction vote?

    Drug Policy Question of the Week – 3-22-11

    As answered by Mary Jane Borden, Editor of Drug War Facts for the Drug Truth Network on 3-22-11. http://www.drugtruth.net/cms/node/3304

    Question of the Week: Can people with a drug conviction vote?

    Just before the election last fall, the Sentencing Project reported,

    “… more than 5 million citizens will be ineligible to vote in the midterm elections in November [2010], including nearly 4 million who reside in the 35 states that still prohibit some combination of persons on probation, parole, and/or people who have completed their sentence from voting.”

    The Bureau of Justice Statistics “Prisoners in 2009” report found that by year end 2008, 251,400 inmates were housed in state facilities as a result of a drug conviction. For 95,079 federal prisoners, a drug offense was the most serious offense.

    The Bureau of Justice Statistics’ “Probation and Parole in theUnited States, 2008” calculated a total of 646,493 probationers for which a drug offense was the most serious offense. Similarly, there were 265,634 adults on parole as a result of a drug conviction.

    Totaling all of the above numbers computes whopping 1,258,606  adults subject to disenfranchisement or the loss of voting rights for drug convictions in 2008.

    The Sentencing Project’s 2011 report Felony Disenfranchisement Laws in the United States states that

    “48 states and the District of Columbia prohibit inmates from voting while incarcerated for a felony offense.  Only two states – Maine and Vermont – permit inmates to vote. … Two states deny the right to vote to all persons with felony convictions, even after they have completed their sentences.”

    Those states are Iowa and Kentucky. Please check the report to find out where your state stands.

    These facts and others like them can be found in the Civil Rights and Prisons and Jails Chapter of Drug War Facts at www.drugwarfacts.org

    .

    1,258,606
  • Cannabis & Hemp - Drug Policy - Question of the Week

    What is dronabinol?

    Drug Policy Question of the Week – 3-12-11

    As answered by Mary Jane Borden, Editor of Drug War Facts for the Drug Truth Network on 3-12-11. http://www.drugtruth.net/cms/node/3302

    Question of the Week: What is dronabinol?

    A November 2010 Federal Register posting by the Drug Enforcement Administration defined dronabinol as,

    “the United States Adopted Name (USAN) for [Delta-9-tetrahydrocannabinol or THC], which is believed to be the major psychoactive component of the cannabis plant [aka] (marijuana).”

    Bantam Medical Dictionary defines, a “United States Adopted Name” as the

    “US generic name for any compound to be used as a drug.”

    Dronabinol is generic for tetrahydrocannabinol or THC.

    Abbott Laboratories markets the pharmaceutical drug Marinol®, containing, using the DEA’s definition,

    “dronabinol in sesame oil and encapsulated in both hard gelatin or soft gelatin capsules.”

    Because Abbott lists dronabinol as the only active ingredient of Marinol®, sesame oil is inactive. Abbott states that dronabinol

    “is also a naturally occurring component of Cannabis sativa L. (Marijuana)”

    and that Marinol is

    “controlled [Schedule III] under the Controlled Substances Act,”

    The naturally occurring Cannabis sativa L, is a tightly restricted and highly illegal plant under Schedule I.

    The Coalition for Rescheduling Cannabis argued in its 2002 Petition to Reschedule Cannabis,”

    Cannabis is a natural source of dronabinol (THC), the ingredient of Marinol, a Schedule III drug. There are no grounds to schedule cannabis in a more restrictive schedule than Marinol”.

    Minus the inactive sesame oil, the DEA seemed to agree with the petition by stating in the Federal Register that,

    “dronabinol products, both naturally-derived or synthetically produced, … meet the criteria for placement in schedule III.”

    If they do, then shouldn’t the source of “naturally-derived” dronabinol (THC) – the tightly restricted and highly illegal Cannabis sativa L plant – be a legal Schedule III as well?

    These facts and others like them can be found in the Medical Marijuana Chapter of Drug War Facts at www.drugwarfacts.org.

  • Cannabis & Hemp - Drug Policy - Question of the Week

    What can hemp be used for?

    Drug Policy Question of the Week – 3-2-11

    As answered by Mary Jane Borden, Editor of Drug War Facts for the Drug Truth Network on 3-2-11. http://www.drugtruth.net/cms/node/3289

    Question of the Week: What can hemp be used for?

    A 2010 report from the Congressional Research Service defines,

    “Hemp, also called “industrial hemp,”3 [as] cannabis varieties that are primarily grown as an agricultural crop (such as seeds and fiber, and byproducts such as oil, seed cake, hurds) …”

    According to the 2008 National Hemp Strategy from the Manitoba Agriculture,

    “The hemp plant has three primary components: bast fibre, hurd, and seed / oil.”

    The report goes on to describe the uses of each,

    “Hemp bast fibres are among the strongest and most durable of natural fibres, with high tensile strength, wet strength, and other characteristics favourable for various industrial products …including cordage (rope, twine, etc.), specialty papers, fabrics for clothing and other applications, and industrial textiles such as geotextiles and carpeting. The strength of hemp fibre also makes it ideal for use in a range of composites for applications such as moulded car parts and fibreboard for construction.”

    “The whole hemp stalk can also be used to produce various biofuels such as bio-oil (or pyrolytic liquid), cellulosic ethanol, (synthetic gas) and methane. … The processes by which hemp is converted to biofuels may also produce valuable chemicals and other materials as bi-products.”

    “Hemp oil is extremely nutritious, and is used in foods and nutraceutical products for humans and animals, as well as in personal care products. Hemp oil is also suitable for use in industrial products such as paints, varnishes, inks and industrial lubricants, and can be used to produce biodiesel. The crushed seed meal left over from oil production is frequently used for animal feed.”

    These facts and others like them can be found in the recently updated Hemp Chapter of Drug War Facts at www.drugwarfacts.org.

  • Drug Policy

    Mandatory Sentencing for Drug Users: A F…

    By Ernest Drucker

    Bill S-10 currently being considered by the House of Commons calls for the introduction of mandatory sentences as deterrents to organized crime and large scale drug dealing in Canada. There are serious doubts about the value of this strategy , and many of the country’s health, research, and academic leaders have objected , aware of the many hazards of this approach . But there is also a body of evidence from the US that can inform Canada’s decision on S -10 and help avoid the disastrous mistake that mandatory drug sentencing has been for the US – in effect launching a 35 year epidemic of mass incarceration and collateral harms to million of Americans.

    During the first 20 years of mandatory drug sentencing I ran a large drug treatment program in the Bronx. Under our Rockefeller drug laws ( the model for mandatory drug sentencing laws in the US ) I watched New York State’s prison system grow from 12,000 to 73,000 – as drug offenders rose from 10% to over 40% of the prison population. Since their passage in 1973 over 150,000 drug users were sentenced to prison under these laws. After release most returned to drugs and related crime – with 1/3 back behind bars in 12 months and 2/3 by 3 years after release. Under such laws the US prison population exploded, reaching 2.5 million by 2009 – the highest incarceration rate in US history and in the world today – six times Canada’s imprisonment rate. Today, as a direct result of mandatory drug sentencing , there are more drug offenders in US prisons (over 600,000) than in all of the prisons of the EU for all offenses. Is this an experiment that Canada really wants to repeat?

  • Drug Policy - Hot Off The 'Net - International

    Mexico Drug War a Lost Cause as Presently Fought

    By Sandy Goodman

    There’s a powerful new piece of evidence that, the way it is being fought, the war on drugs on the Mexican-American border is a lost cause. It comes in a report issued by the Council on Foreign Relations, a highly-respected foreign policy think tank, that recommends that, as an experiment, the federal government allow states “to legalize the production, sale, taxation and consumption of marijuana.” The report says authorities should redirect scarce law enforcement resources to stopping the importation of more dangerous drugs like heroin, cocaine and methamphetamine.