NEW YORK DOCTORS CALL ON NEW YORK SENATE HEALTH COMMITTEE CHAIR TO STOP STALLING BY MISLEADING MEDICAL PROFESSIONALS AND THE PUBLIC ABOUT LEGAL RISKS TO PHYSICIANS WHO RECOMMEND MEDICAL MARIJUANA AND ALLOW A VOTE
NEW YORK STATE SENATOR Kemp Hannon (R-Garden City), Chair of the NY State Senate Health Committee, astonished thousands of patients and health professionals, including public demonstrators with multiple sclerosis, when he told the media in Garden City, Long Island today that he felt that it was "reasonable to hold off on consenting" to the Compassionate Care Act (s.4406/Savino), which would allow the medical use of marijuana by medically authorized patients with debilitating illnesses in New York State, stating as his reason that physicians who would be "recommending marijuana" to their patients would be "subject to criminal penalties" under federal law. Senator Hannon's Health Committee must take up the bill before it can go to the Senate floor for a vote, making his position an important one for the future prospects of the bill.
Manhattan physician Sunil Aggarwal, MD, PhD, Vice-Chair of New York Physicians for Compassionate Care, which represents over 600 licensed physicians in New York State who are advocating for a legal right to medical marijuana for patients, stated in response to Senator Hannon's comments:
"Senator Hannon's position on medical marijuana is severely misinformed, completely unreasonable, and so factually incorrect that it begs the question if this is nothing more that an attempt to find any excuse to obstruct the legislative process which would enable patients with debilitating conditions such as pain, wasting, and muscle spasms to obtain this potentially beneficial medication. His statement that physicians face federal prosecution for recommending medical marijuana is completely wrong, medically and legally."
In a November 2009 report entitled "Use of Cannabis for Medicinal Purposes", American Medical Association estimated that, at the time of its writing, "approximately 7,000 physicians" had "authorized the use of cannabis for at least 400,000 patients" in the various states that had operational medical marijuana programs. The report went on to note that: "In Conant v. Walters the United States Court of Appeals in a permanent injunction recognized that physicians have a constitutionally-protected right to discuss the use of marijuana as a treatment option with their patients and to make oral or written recommendations for medical marijuana (the AMA had already endorsed this view)." In part, the AMA addressed this concern in response to a request for "clear, indisputable confirmation" regarding whether or not physicians who recommend medical marijuana would be subject to federal prosecution raised in the AMA House of Delegates by the New York delegation of physicians in June 2009.
Additionally, the authoritative, nonpartisan, and impartial Congressional Research Service, which provides legal analysis to Congress, noted in a 2010 report on "Medical Marijuana: Review and Analysis of Federal and State Policies" that: "The federal government...may not initiate an investigation of a physician solely on the basis of a recommendation of marijuana within a bona fide doctor-patient relationship, unless the government in good faith believes that it has substantial evidence of criminal conduct.”
Aggarwal continued, "The US Supreme Court has allowed this decision to stand and that is why the thousands of physicians who have recommended medical marijuana are protected from federal prosecution when discussing this treatment and recommending it to their patients, if appropriate." Aggarwal, an associate member of the New York Academy of Medicine, severed as an external reviewer for the 2009 American Medical Association report and led the effort to change the AMA's position to call for the review of the outdated Schedule I status of marijuana in federal law. New York Physicians for Compassionate Care calls upon the New York State Senate to help to correct the injustice and bad faith medical regulation at the federal level and give patients in New York State under a health professional's care access to medical marijuana, a non-toxic therapeutic option for relief from debilitating illness.
Links in Press Release:NY Physicians for Compassionate Care -- http://www.compassionatecareny.org/physician-support/Senator Hannon's comments -- http://gardencity.patch.com/groups/around-town/p/video-advocates-rally-for-passage-of-medical-marijuana-billAmerican Medical Association report -- http://www.ama-assn.org//resources/doc/csaph/i09csaph3ft.pdfCongressional Research Service report -- http://www.fas.org/sgp/crs/misc/RL33211.pdf
Sunil Aggarwal, M.D., Ph.D. 206-375-3785 sunila at uw dot edu
