Pubdate: Sun, 10 May 2015
Source: Seattle Times (WA)
Copyright: 2015 The Seattle Times Company
Contact:  http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/409
Author: Evan Bush

ACTIVIST CALLS STATE OUT ON SAFETY OF RECREATIONAL MARIJUANA

Supporter of Medical Marijuana Doesn't Want Cannabis Patients in Same System

Seated at a desk inside his downtown Seattle hotel room, Dr. Gil 
Mobley pulled out a sterile field surgery kit, snapped on latex 
gloves and pulled a mask over his face.

He carefully arranged his medical instruments, grabbed tweezers and 
went to work.

Mobley, 60, wasn't performing hotel-room surgery. He and fellow 
medical-marijuana activist Brian Stone were carefully preparing two 
ounces of Blazin's Grapefruit purchased that morning from Uncle Ike's 
Pot Shop in Seattle's Central District. The pot cost more than $700.

The room reeked when a hotel maid cracked the door and said, 
"housekeeping." Mobley shooed her away.

Mobley and Stone ground about half the golf-ball-size buds, then 
loaded three grams of powdered pot and three grams of fresh bud into 
16 plastic vials.

Later that day, Mobley took his vials along with packages of 
marijuana concentrate to five Seattle-area labs. He took a slew of 
samples to Portland for pesticide testing later that week.

Convinced he'd find wideranging results, Mobley sought to discredit 
the Initiative 502 testing program.

"I have a hypothesis. It's a gamble it will work out. We need 
consistent testing and to add pesticides" to current regulations for 
recreational marijuana, he said.

Weeks later, with the Legislature deep in debate over medical 
marijuana's future, Mobley spearheaded a protest at Uncle Ike's, 
claiming the Liquor Control Board (LCB) "is lying." He also sent a 
letter to legislators with his claims.

It's as much stunt as science, but the results of Mobley's tests 
suggest he's on to something: Potency tests aren't precise. Results 
vary from lab to lab.

That's not news to the LCB or the laboratories, who say the program 
is still developing. The LCB is not aware of any reports of harm 
caused by marijuana from the state system. Plus, testing medical 
marijuana has never been required nor regulated.

Depending on perspective, Mobley is either a noisy idealist sounding 
alarm about problems everyone already knows about to further his 
political agenda. Or, he's a public-health champion looking out for pot users.

"Citizen science"

The results of Mobley's tests, shared with The Seattle Times in their 
original form, showed inconsistency.

Of five samples of Blazin's Grapefruit bud Mobley tested in 
state-sanctioned labs, one failed standards for yeast and mold 
contamination and another failed for having too much moisture.

Potency tests for total THC, the psychoactive component of marijuana, 
ranged from about 17 to 23 percent. At the store, the label for the 
jar of Blazin's Grapefruit reported about 22 percent total THC.

Results for the concentrate varied, too. Even though the concentrate 
all came from the same batch, three labs pegged it at about 60 
percent total THC. One reported about 55 percent total THC. Another 
reported it about 85 percent.

No pesticides were detected in a variety of products Mobley took to Portland.

In an independent, blind analysis of Mobley's potency results, Rodger 
Voelker, Ph.D, a lab director at OG Analytical, of Eugene, Ore., said 
the potency tests were "a little better than I expected" but still 
showed "unacceptable levels of variance."

But Voelker cautioned against drawing conclusions from Mobley's 
experiment. "We cannot actually attribute the variability we see in 
the data to the labs," said Voelker.

Marijuana crops are not uniform. Without determining how much the 
sample naturally varies, Voelker said, it's not possible to determine 
if the labs are off, or the product is.

"To put together a real (proficiency testing) study is a complicated 
process. There are very strict procedures to do that," said Voelker.

Laboratory directors rejected Mobley's experiment.

"It's citizen science and it shouldn't be respected," said Michelle 
Sexton, the chief science officer at PhytaLab, one of the labs Mobley targeted.

"First of all, an experiment really shouldn't have a predetermined 
outcome," said Nick Mosely, the chief scientist at Confidence 
Analytics. "This guy had a conclusion before he did an experiment. 
It's a piss-poor experiment right off the bat."

The laboratories have been forthright about their industry's problems.

Sexton said different labs use different methodologies, equipment and 
protocols, which could account for the varied results.

"And you've always got human error. Scientists themselves are not 
infallible," she said.

They also question Mobley's methods and agenda:

"As the primary consumer-safety element in this industry, I don't 
think his best tactic is to point at (labs) as a failure," said Mosely.

"Serial activist"

Mobley has stirred the pot before, and not just with marijuana.

Last October, when the Ebola scare was beginning to take hold 
nationally, Mobley walked through Atlanta's Hartsfield-Jackson 
Airport wearing a hazmat suit that read, "CDC is lying." He made 
international news. Mobley, a physician who speaks with a smooth 
Southern drawl, said he was morally driven to demonstrate because he 
believed the Centers for Disease Control had fallen asleep at the 
wheel in dealing with the outbreak. "Sadly, I became FOX's darling," 
said Mobley, who sees himself as a "serial activist."

"They call us the yellers and the smellers," he said, describing the 
perception of his medical-marijuana activist friends. "I'm the former."

Although he lives in Springfield, Mo., now, Mobley ran a Federal Way 
clinic catering to medical-marijuana patients earlier this decade. 
Along with Steve Sarich, whose controversial tactics earned him the 
title "Medical Marijuana's Bad Boy" in a Seattle Weekly article, 
Mobley formed the backbone of opposition to the initiative to 
legalize marijuana. Sarich helped organize Mobley's protest at Uncle Ike's.

Mobley said he supports the idea of recreational pot and believes 
"marijuana is safer than alcohol" but fears "we're setting people up 
for a Maureen Dowd experience" because test results are not precise.

He wants everyone to be able to grow their own pot and doesn't 
believe the public is safe under current practices. "The lack of 
directives, regulation and monitoring is a joke," Mobley wrote in an 
email. "And it's a joke to imply the state-approved cannabis is safe 
because it's 'tested.' "

Mobley said medical-marijuana patients shouldn't be under the state's 
current testing regime.

That fight's all but concluded. The governor last month signed 
Legislation to fold medical marijuana into the state system. The LCB, 
to be renamed the Liquor and Cannabis Board, is required to adopt 
standards for testing medical pot.

Patients will be allowed to grow their own marijuana, though 
potentially less than they were previously allowed.

Learning from scratch

The LCB is rather frank about the problems with its testing program.

Randy Simmons, the state's marijuana project director, said federal 
prohibition puts the agency in a tricky spot. Most products are 
tested for consumer safety by the feds, he said.

That means unfamiliar state agencies have had to learn from scratch.

Moreover, the wider "scientific community doesn't want to be involved 
in this" because of its legal status, said Simmons. "Right now, we 
don't have assistance from the major research facilities and universities."

"Things are moving slowly," said Simmons. "This industry is in its infancy."

Simmons said the agency plans to direct growers on how to take 
representative samples from their crop for testing. Soon, they won't 
be able to select the cleanest, most potent buds, he said.

He also said the LCB recognizes that current labels convey an 
accuracy that the products can't deliver. Simmons said the agency is 
considering presenting test results as a range. For example, labels 
might say 13.5-16.5 instead of 15 percent THC, he said.

The LCB is just getting a secret-shopping program, announced several 
months ago, off the ground. The state Department of Agriculture soon 
will begin testing marijuana purchased off store shelves by 
enforcement officers.

Marijuana enforcement officers have found some companies skirting the 
rules. At least five growers have been cited for "using unauthorized 
pesticides, soil amendments, fertilizers, other crop production 
aids," according to LCB records.

The agency is not testing for pesticides, but says it is working on 
protocols to do that.

Still, focusing on the recreational industry's problems seems 
misguided to Simmons when patients are purchasing unregulated 
products from medical-marijuana dispensaries.

"I'm not sure how he (Mobley) thinks the product out there is safe on 
the medical side right now," said Simmons.

Mobley said he's mostly upset with how he hears politicians and 
industry leaders present the issue.

"Recreational is being held out ... as tested and safe," said Mobley. 
"Medical isn't."

Chants and confusion

Not one for subtlety, Mobley wore a hazmat suit and goggles to Uncle 
Ike's for his protest of testing regulations, just as he'd done for Ebola.

"Pesticides, fungicides we don't know. How could Olympia stoop so 
low," chanted about 12 medical-marijuana activists he'd organized.

But the protest might have missed its mark. One bemused passer-by 
tweeted: "Why are there angry Devo fans outside Uncle Ike's Pot Shop?"

The owner of Uncle Ike's, whose store was picketed by a nearby church 
last year, didn't understand either.

"At least our other protesters had God on their side. These guys had 
nothing," said Ian Eisenberg. "Most of the customers at this point 
understand our pot is tested and maybe tests aren't perfect ... but 
it's better than nothing."
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MAP posted-by: Jay Bergstrom