XPost: alt.politics, alt.politics.republican, alt.politics.democrats   
   From: monkeyhawk@cox.net   
      
         Potheads and Sudafed   
         by JOHN TIERNEY   
         The New York Times   
         April 25, 2006   
      
         Police officers in the 1960's were fond of bumper stickers reading:   
   "The next time you get mugged, call a hippie." Doctors today could use a   
   variation: "The next time you're in pain, call a narc."   
      
         Washington's latest prescription for patients in pain is the statement   
   issued last week by the Food and Drug Administration on the supposed evils   
   of medical marijuana. The F.D.A. is being lambasted, rightly, by scientists   
   for ignoring some evidence that marijuana can help severely ill patients.   
   But it's the kind of statement given by a hostage trying to please his   
   captors, who in this case are a coalition of Republican narcs on Capitol   
   Hill, in the White House and at the Drug Enforcement Administration.   
      
         They've been engaged in a long-running war to get the F.D.A. to   
   abandon some of its quaint principles, like the notion that it's not fair to   
   deny a useful drug to patients just because a few criminals might abuse it.   
   The agency has also dared to suggest that there should be a division of   
   labor when it comes to drugs: scientists and doctors should figure out which   
   ones work for patients, and narcotics agents should catch people who break   
   drug laws.   
      
         The drug cops want everyone to share their mission. They think that   
   doctors and pharmacists should catch patients who abuse painkillers -- and   
   that if the doctors or pharmacists aren't good enough detectives, they   
   should go to jail for their naïveté.   
      
         This month, pharmacists across the country are being forced to lock up   
   another menace to society: cold medicine. Allergy and cold remedies   
   containing pseudoephedrine, a chemical that can illegally be used to make   
   meth, must now be locked behind the counter under a provision in the new   
   Patriot Act.   
      
         Don't ask what meth has to do with the war on terror. Not even the   
   most ardent drug warriors have been able to establish an Osama-Sudafed link.   
      
         The F.D.A. opposed these restrictions for pharmacies because they'll   
   drive up health care costs and effectively prevent medicine from reaching   
   huge numbers of people (Americans suffer a billion colds per year). These   
   costs are undeniable, but it's unclear that there are any net benefits.   
      
         In states that previously enacted their own restrictions, the police   
   report that meth users simply switched from making their own to buying   
   imported drugs that were stronger -- and more expensive, so meth users   
   commit more crimes to pay for their habit.   
      
         The Sudafed law gives you a preview of what's in store if   
   Representative Frank Wolf, a Virginia Republican, succeeds in giving the   
   D.E.A. a role in deciding which new drugs get approved. So far, despite a   
   temporary success last year, he hasn't been able to impose this policy, but   
   the F.D.A.'s biggest fear is that Congress will let the drug police veto new   
   medications. In that case, who would ever develop a better painkiller? The   
   benefits to patients would never outweigh the potential inconvenience to the   
   police.   
      
         Officially, the D.E.A. says it wants patients to get the best   
   medicine. But look at what it's done to scientists trying to study medical   
   marijuana. They've gotten approval for their experiments from the F.D.A.,   
   but they can't get the high-quality marijuana they need because the D.E.A.   
   won't allow it to be grown. The F.D.A. actually wants to know if the drug   
   works, but the D.E.A. is following the just-say-know-nothing strategy: as   
   long as researchers can't study marijuana, they can't come up with evidence   
   that it's effective.   
      
         And as long as there's no conclusive evidence that medical marijuana   
   works, the D.E.A. and its allies on Capitol Hill can go on blindly fighting   
   it. Representative Mark Souder, the Indiana Republican who's the most rabid   
   drug warrior in Congress, has been pressuring the F.D.A. to crack down on   
   medical marijuana. Last week the agency finally relented: in return for not   
   having to start busting anyone, it issued a statement stressing the   
   potential dangers and lack of extensive clinical trials establishing medical   
   marijuana's effectiveness.   
      
         The statement was denounced as a victory of politics over science, but   
   it's hard to see what political good it does the Republican Party.   
      
         Locking up crack and meth dealers is popular, but voters take a   
   different view of cancer patients who swear by marijuana. Medical marijuana   
   has been approved in referendums in four states that went red in 2004:   
   Nevada, Montana, Colorado and Alaska. For G.O.P. voters fed up with their   
   party's current big-government philosophy, the latest medical treatment from   
   Washington's narcs is one more reason to stay home this November.   
      
   --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05   
    * Origin: you cannot sedate... all the things you hate (1:229/2)