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    ...a weekly service for the media on news items related to Marijuana
                                Prohibition.
                              January 2, 1997
             Clinton Plan Attacks Medical Marijuana Initiatives,
                               Targets Doctors
      January 2, 1997, Washington D.C.:  The Clinton administration
announced at a December 30 press conference that doctors who prescribe or
recommend marijuana under voter-approved provisions in California and
Arizona may face criminal prosecution under federal law and lose their
ability to write prescriptions.  Federal officials had threatened to take
such action for months, but had not endorsed a formal strategy until
Monday's press conference.
      "The recent passage of propositions which make dangerous drugs more
available in California and Arizona poses a threat to the National Drug
Control Strategy goal of reducing drug abuse in the United States," stated
Drug Czar Barry McCaffrey in a seven-page release outlining the
administration's response to the initiatives.  "These propositions are not
about compassion, they are about legalizing dangerous drugs," he told
reporters.
      The administration's proposal states that the Drug Enforcement
Administration (DEA) will revoke the federal registrations of physicians who
recommend or prescribe marijuana according to the provisions of the newly
enacted state laws.  McCaffrey and Attorney General Janet Reno also stated
that the Justice Department may criminally prosecute physicians who
prescribe marijuana for use in treatment.
      "I believe it's outrageous that the federal government is using
taxpayer's money in this way, to go after honest doctors caring for very
sick people," said Dr. Toni Brayer of the San Francisco Medical Society,
which represents about 2,200 AIDS and cancer specialists in the bay area and
backs California's medical marijuana measure.  Brayer was one of many
physicians nationwide who criticized the administration's strategy.  She
accused the administration of using "scare tactics to frighten legitimate
doctors from using [marijuana] for very sick people."
      Fellow San Francisco physician, Dr. Richard Cohen agreed. "The
federal government is stepping in and literally intimidating ... a patient
population that could be helped," he told reporters.
      They can't go after the voters in California and Arizona, so they go
after the medical profession," said Dr. David C. Lewis, director of the
Center for Alcohol and Addictive Studies at Brown University.  "Now the
federal government is entering the practice of medicine, placing itself in
the physician's office between the doctor and patient.
      Congressman Barney Frank (D-Mass.) also announced his opposition to
the Clinton-backed plan.  "Medical practitioners who are following the
dictates of their profession and the laws adopted by the voters of their
states by prescribing the method they think best suited to reduce suffering
in seriously ill people do not deserve to be persecuted by the federal
government," said Frank, a longtime supporter of medical marijuana.  Frank
worked with NORML in 1995 to introduce federal legislation permitting
physicians to prescribe marijuana as a therapeutic agent for seriously ill
patients (H.R. 2618).  "What we have here is an instance of the Federal
Executive Branch... overturning the voters of two states, not because of
some conflict with some Constitutional principle, but because the federal
government disagrees with the citizen's policy choices."
      NORML Executive Director, Attorney R. Keith Stroup elaborated on
Frank's statements.  "Although the state initiatives exempt medical patients
from state criminal penalties prohibiting the cultivation and use of
marijuana, Justice Department lawyers concede that there exists no solid
constitutional grounds for attacking the initiatives in court.  There is no
requirement that each state adopt criminal penalty to mimic each and every
federal drug law."
      Stroup also questioned the administration's assurance that it "will
continue to review claims about the possible [medical] benefit of smoked
marijuana," noting that an FDA-approved protocol by San Francisco researcher
Dr. Donald Abrams to examine marijuana's effect on the AIDS wasting syndrome
has been stonewalled by the National Institute on Drug Abuse for four
years.  Recent plans to conduct a state-sponsored study at Washington State
University to evaluate claims by cancer patients and others about the
medical effectiveness of marijuana have also been delayed by federal
officials, Stroup added.  "Government officials are engaging in sophistry.
On the one hand, they deny the existence of scientific studies conducted
throughout the 1970's and 1980's indicating marijuana's medical utility and
block new federal research, while on the other, they argue that the sick and
dying should be denied an effective medication because there is not enough
research."
      Loren Siegel, director of public education for the American Civil
Liberties Union (ACLU) agreed. Calling McCaffrey's remarks the "height of
hypocrisy" in a released statement, Siegel noted that the federal
"government has consistently impeded research into medical marijuana -- for
political, not scientific reasons."
      Another critical aspect of the controversial federal plan allows the
DEA to "adopt" seizures of marijuana and other Schedule I controlled
substances made by state and local law enforcement officials following an
arrest where state and local prosecutors must decline prosecution because of
the newly established state laws.  Once in the possession of the DEA, the
drugs can be destroyed and further criminal action may be pursued.  However,
federal officials admit that it is unlikely that the agency will prosecute
small time offenders.
      The administration also warned employees and contractors who received
federal funds that individuals may not use the state provisions as an
exemption to the requirements of the Federal Drug-Free Workplace program.
"Medical Review Officers will not accept physician recommendations for
Schedule I substances as a legitimate explanation for a positive drug test,"
the plan states.
      In addition, the plan recommends that physicians who prescribe or
recommend marijuana to patients be excluded from the Medicaid and Medicare
programs.
      The American Medical Association (AMA), one of the country's primary
physician's groups, urged doctor's "to prescribe [only] effective, legal
medications ... to compassionately treat disease and relieve pain" for now,
and requested for "federal funding of research to determine the validity of
marijuana as an effective medical treatment."
      "The administration's actions this week effectively wreak havoc on
not only states' rights and the will of the voters, but also on the First
Amendment rights of doctors and the privileged relationship between a
physician and his or her patient," summarized NORML Deputy Director Allen
St. Pierre.  "Patients who could benefit from marijuana's therapeutic value
remain held hostage by a federal administration that appears more concerned
about political rhetoric than the well being of the sick and dying."
      For more information or a copy of the administration's seven-page
strategy, please contact Allen St. Pierre or Paul Armentano of NORML @ (202)
483-5500.  For further information on medical marijuana, please contact
either Dave Fratello of Americans for Medical Rights @ (310) 394-2952 or
Dale Gieringer of California NORML @ (415) 563-5858.  For information on the
Arizona initiative, please contact Sam Vagenus of Arizonans for Drug Policy
Reform @ (602) 285-0468.  Dr. Donald Abrams of UC-San Francisco may be
contacted @ (415)476-9554.
                                    -END-
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