Why won't the Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA)
listen to it's own Administrative Law Judge
regarding medical use of Cannabis?

In 1988, following an extended legal battle, DEA Administrative Law Judge Francis L. Young ruled on a petition to reschedule marijuana. The full text of his findings is available at the Schaffer Library of Drug Policy. Here is some of what he said:

OPINION AND RECOMMENDED RULING, FINDING OF FACT,
CONCLUSION OF LAW AND DECISION
by FRANCIS L. YOUNG, DEA Administrative Law Judge

1. Richard J. Gralla, MD, an oncologist and Professor of Medicine who was an Agency witness, accepts that in treating cancer patients, oncologists can use the cannabinoids with safety despite their side effects.

2. Andrew T. Weil, MD, who now practices medicine in Tucson, Arizona and is on the faculty of the College of Medicine, University of Arizona, was a member of the first team of researchers to perform a Federal Government-authorized study into the effects of marijuana on human subjects. This team made its study in 1968. These researchers determined that marijuana could be used safely under medical supervision. In the twenty years since then, Dr. Weil has seen no information that would cause him to reconsider that conclusion. There is no question in his mind that marijuana is safe for use under appropriate medical supervision.

3. The most obvious concern when dealing with drug safety is the possibility of lethal effect. Can the drug cause death?

4. Nearly all medicines have a toxic, potentially lethal effect, but marijuana is not such a substance. There is no known record in the extensive medical literature describing a proven, documented cannabis-induced fatality.

   

5. This is a remarkable statement. First, the record on marijuana encompasses 5,000 years of human experience. Second, marijuana is now used daily by enormous numbers of people throughout the world. Estimates suggest that from twenty to fifty million Americans routinely, albeit illegally, smoke marijuana without the benefit of direct medical supervision. Yet, despite this long history of use and the extraordinarily high numbers of social smokers, there are simply no credible reports to suggest that consuming marijuana has caused a single death.

6. By contrast, aspirin, a commonly-used, over-the-counter medicine, causes hundreds of deaths each year.

7. Drugs used in medicine are routinely given what is called LD-50. The LD-50 rating indicates at what dosage 50% of test animals receiving a drug will die as a result of drug-induced toxicity. A number of researchers have attempted to determine marijuana's LD-50 rating in test animals, without success. Simply stated, researchers have been unable to give animals enough marijuana to induce death.

8. At present it is estimated that marijuana's LD-50 is around 1:20,000 or 1:40,000. In layman's terms, this means that in order to induce death, a marijuana smoker would have to consume 20,000 to 40,000 times as much marijuana as is contained in one marijuana cigarette. A NIDA-supplied marijuana cigarette has approximately .9 grams. A smoker would theoretically have to consume nearly 1,500 pounds of marijuana within fifteen minutes to induce a lethal response.

9. In practical terms, marijuana cannot induce a lethal response as a result of drug-related toxicity.

15. In strict medical terms marijuana is far safer than many foods we commonly consume. For example, eating ten raw potatoes can result in a toxic response. By comparison, it is physically impossible to eat enough marijuana to induce death.

16. Marijuana, in its natural form, is one of the safest therapeutically active substances known to man. By any measure of rational analysis marijuana can be safely used within a supervised routine of medical care.

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