Pubdate: Fri, 16 Jul 2010
Source: Express-Times, The (PA)
Copyright: 2010 The Express-Times
Contact: http://www.lehighvalleylive.com/opinion/sendaletter/
Website: http://www.lehighvalleylive.com/expresstimes/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/1489
Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/mmj.htm (Cannabis - Medicinal)

NEW JERSEY'S MEDICAL MARIJUANA PROGRAM NEEDS DIRECTION, CLEAR THINKING

Who will grow it?

Who will dispense it?

Who will make money on it?

Just six months after the New Jersey Legislature passed a bill to 
legalize marijuana for people with a demonstrated medical need, the 
still-to-be-inaugurated program is bogging down in the rule making.

The legislation called for certified nonprofit organizations to 
procure the drug and make it available at convenient locations around 
the state. Legislators insisted upon safeguards -- such as 
prohibiting storefront pot shops -- to prevent the Garden State from 
becoming the wrong kind of garden state.

California and Colorado are examples of how too-easy medical pot laws 
lead to de facto legalization.

Now, however, Gov. Chris Christie and legislative leaders are 
entertaining proposals that would drastically alter the legislative 
intent for cultivation and delivery. The state's teaching hospitals 
are seeking to become the exclusive dispensers of medical marijuana, 
promising to provide an added level of security. The proposal by the 
New Jersey Council of Teaching Hospitals envisions Rutgers 
University's School of Environmental and Biological Sciences becoming 
the sole legal grower in the state.

While these ideas are worth considering -- the hospitals say they'd 
go after research dollars and revenue to train physicians -- they 
also threaten to delay relief to people who have been waiting to 
treat symptoms of cancer, multiple sclerosis, AIDS and other health 
afflictions. Postponing this for possibly a year or more sentences 
them to unnecessary suffering and encourages them to take the law 
into their own hands in a state that, on their behalf, has legalized 
medical pot.

Also, this comes as a surprise to some people at Rutgers. Robert 
Goodman, dean of the Rutgers agricultural experiment station, which 
develops strains of seeds for commercial use, said he doesn't want to 
be the official grower of marijuana or any other product.

Only 16 of the 40 teaching hospitals in the state would be designated 
as dispensaries. That's a concern for those who don't live close to a 
teaching hospital, including residents of Warren and Hunterdon counties.

Legislators deserve credit for insisting on a medical marijuana 
program that won't devolve into a Cheech and Chong movie. But 
sequestering this process in a hospital/university setting, run by 
people who don't necessarily agree with the assignment or the goals, 
sounds like a prescription for a bad public service.

The state needs to provide for secure marijuana dispensaries in each 
county. Placing too many obstacles in front of sick people will cause 
the "private" market to compete for their business -- and win, if it 
has better service and pain relief. That's not what anyone in Trenton intended.
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MAP posted-by: Jay Bergstrom