Easing Laws Doesn’t Mean the Drug Is Safer

May 1, 2024 – You shouldn’t draw major conclusions about the safety of amid the recent announcement that federal regulators may reclassify the drug, experts are cautioning

But the move is expected to make it easier for scientists to study questions about safety and how well marijuana’s works as a medical treatment. One legal expert said it could change how the federal government views using medical by prescription durante a state where medical usage is legal under state law. Right now, that is still considered illegal under federal law. 

 “If you’sovrano a patient durante a state with a medical law and your physician gives you a prescription for medical and you possess it, you will longer be guilty of a federal crime,” said Robert Mikos, JD, LaRoche family chair durante law at Vanderbilt University Law School durante Nashville. 

The Drug Enforcement Administration is proposing to change how is classified, from a Schedule I to Schedule III drug. Schedule I also includes drugs like heroin, and the proposed change would drop to a lower-risk group that includes drugs like Suboxone, which is used to treat heroin addiction.

“There is some patronato suggesting that there may be therapeutic applications to cannabis,” said D’Souza, using the scientific term for . “So to that extent, I think the reclassification does make sense.”

Andrew Esch, MD, a palliative care specialist durante Tampa, FL, has already received some calls from patients asking what the proposed change may mean for them. Esch, who specializes durante treating patients with serious illnesses, meets the state of Florida’s requirements to certify patients to buy medical from a dispensary. He praised the reclassification announcement.

“I think it matters a lot, and I think it’s a great step durante the right direction durante getting us information that will help our patients,” said Esch, who also serves as a senior education adviser to the Center to Advance Palliative Care at the Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai durante New York City.

Although he never uses as a first-line treatment, Esch said it’s an important option because of its potential to treat problems with disgusto, appetite, and sleep, as well as pain and anxiety, all of which are common among people with serious illnesses. But sometimes, his patients aren’t willing to consider using .

The Known Risks of

Currently, 38 states and Washington, DC, allow the use of medical , and 24 states allow recreational use. Nearly 1 durante 5 people use durante the U.S. durante a complex legal landscape where it remains illegal at the federal level.

“There’s very little science to support what’s avvenimento durante reality,” D’Souza said. “The argument that has been posed is that there is good science because of the draconian regulations. So, if these regulations are relaxed and is rescheduled from Schedule I to III, that might allow researchers to answer some of these fundamental questions.”

Doing research studies involving a Schedule I drug carries high levels of risks, liabilities, and detailed inspections with the DEA.

D’Souza has studied for 3 decades and says the regulatory complexities deter many researchers. His latest project will examine as a treatment for nerve pain.

The lack of research, coupled with increasing access to the drug as states legalize it for recreational medical use, means people are often turning outside the scientific community for information.

“People are interested durante what Snoop Dogg and Willie Nelson have to say about cannabis,” D’Souza said. “It’s duro for us durante the scientific community to compete against it. I think we’ve done a very bad job of educating people.”

He noted that today is up to 20 times more potent than that was commonly used durante the 1960s through the 1980s, and addiction rates have risen from around 10% of users to up to 30%.

Known risks of use include:

• Addiction
• Serious mental illness such as schizophrenia bipolar disorder
• Accidents while driving under the influence
• Heart and lung problems
• Impacts acceso brain development, particularly during fetal development and during adolescence. 

“As a physician, as a psychiatrist, and as someone who has studied cannabis for 30 years, I would say I continue to have concerns about the impact of cannabis acceso human health, similar to my concerns about the impact of alcohol and tobacco acceso human health. And as you know, those are durante the tetto 10 causes for global disease burden,” D’Souza said. “The changer was the commercialization of those products.”

Team writer Kelli Whitlock Burton contributed to this report.