Pubdate: Wed, 17 Sep 2014
Source: Denver Post (CO)
Copyright: 2014 The Denver Post Corp
Contact:  http://www.denverpost.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/122
Author: John Ingold
Page: 8A

YOUNG MEDICAL POT PATIENTS STILL IN LIMBO

The state health board rejects a caregiver cap but says parents got 
the marijuana oil against the law.

The Colorado Board of Health on Tuesday rejected a proposal to cap 
the number of patients that medical-marijuana caregivers can serve. 
Photos by Craig F. Walker, The Denver Post Lonnie and Sandy Phillips 
on Tuesday address the media at Arnold& Porter LLP in Denver, where 
they announced a suit against four ammunition sellers. Their 
daughter, Jessica Ghawi, was killed in the theater massacre.

But some parents who feared the cap could leave them without a source 
for the special medical-marijuana oil they use to treat their 
children still left the meeting in limbo, after state health 
officials told them they have been obtaining the oil against the law.

"We still have a problem there," said board member Rick Brown. "We 
have no ability to affect the bigger issue here today."

Caregivers are nonprofit marijuana providers who are supposed to give 
patients personalized attention including growing marijuana for them. 
State law says caregivers wanting to serve more than five patients at 
a time must obtain a waiver.

Only 20 caregivers have done so - less than 1 percent of the state's 
total- and only four currently serve more than 10 patients, the 
health department's proposed limit. Health officials say those 
caregivers are operating more like small businesses and their large 
cultivation facilities pose health and public safety risks.

But the Board of Health rejected the cap at a hearing Tuesday, with 
several members saying they think a more rigorous waiver process is a 
better way to address the concerns.

That provided confusing comfort, though, for the roughly two dozen 
parents who attended the hearing. The families use a special 
non-psychoactive marijuana oil provided by a Boulder County caregiver 
named Jason Cranford to treat their children's severe illnesses. 
Cranford says he serves more than 80 patients, and the parents 
worried the cap would leave them without a provider.

"I don't know how to grow this stuff," said Wendy Turner, who moved 
to Colorado from Illinois to treat her son's Crohn's disease with the 
oil. "I would be lost without Jason Cranford."

But health officials said at the hearing that parents cannot obtain 
medical-marijuana for their kids from a separate caregiver at all. 
Under Colorado law, only the parents of a child medical marijuana 
patient can be the caregiver for that child, the officials contend. 
Another area of the law prohibits one caregiver from delegating 
authority-such as growing marijuana-to another caregiver.

But Dr. Larry Wolk, the head of the health department, said the 
department doesn't have enforcement authority to stop the practice.

"It's confusing," he said after the hearing. "We have a confusing system."
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MAP posted-by: Jay Bergstrom