Pubdate: Sat, 12 Jul 2014 Source: Boston Herald (MA) Copyright: 2014 The Boston Herald, Inc Contact: http://news.bostonherald.com/ Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/53 Page: 8 A REDO ON POT LAW It's hardly a secret that this state's medical marijuana law is a joke and the hapless Department of Public Health's handling of dispensary licenses has served only to confirm that. The 2012 ballot initiative - envisioned by pot advocates as a mere way station on the road to full legalization - included a laundry list of "debilitating medical conditions" for which the drug could be "prescribed," but the bottom line was it could be for any "other conditions as determined in writing" by a "qualifying physician." That might explain why those seeking licenses wanted to locate either as near to college campuses as they could get or in areas that already hosted, say, a methadone clinic. The shoddy Massachusetts law now stands in marked contrast to a medical marijuana bill just signed into law by New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo, which prohibits the use of any smokeable form of the drug. That's right, New York just took the fun out of cannabis and will attempt to actually provide those who could benefit from its use some actual relief. The law, which that state's public health regulators will have the next 18 months to implement, allows only forms of the drug that can be ingested or consumed as a vapor. And it permits the prescribing of it for only 10 specific ailments listed in the legislation, including epilepsy, AIDS and Parkinson's disease. The state will approve up to five businesses to grow and distribute the drug. Each operator could have up to four dispensaries statewide. The New York law, particularly its ban on smoking, was hailed in a Wall Street Journal op-ed by Dr. Steven Patierno, a professor at Duke University School of Medicine and deputy director of the Duke Cancer Institute, as "good science and an act of common sense." The method of delivering the drug will help assure "fixed dosage levels and safety monitoring" for purity. It will also help the medical profession actually assess the effectiveness of the drug, which can be standardized for potency of its active ingredients. Now unlike the ill-conceived ballot measure that passed here, New York's law was carefully crafted by lawmakers. Massachusetts legislators surely could have done the same here - it wouldn't have been the first time the Legislature came in to tidy up the results of a ballot question. With the current law now a proven disaster, it's not too late to redo it, using the New York model. - --- MAP posted-by: Matt