Senate panel outlines who would be allowed medical marijuana

Louisiana legislators grappled Wednesday with who qualifies for a medical prescription for marijuana Wednesday, and expanding the number of pharmacists who can acquire a license to provide it.
Following an hour and a half debate, Senate Bill 271 by Sen. Fred Mills, R-Parks, containing specific qualifiers, ultimately received favorable treatment in the Senate Health and Welfare Committee.
“There’s too many families that I have met that have gone to other states or are growing marijuana at their house and pressing the oils, saying ‘Please help me because I can’t pass a drug screen at work but I don’t have seizures anymore,’” Mills said. “I’m more worried about that than anything else.”
Medical marijuana already is legal in Louisiana. Mills’ bill clarifies the distribution.
The bill defines qualifying medical conditions as: cancer, glaucoma, positive status for human immunodeficiency virus (HIV), acquired immune deficiency syndrome (AIDS), any disease or medical condition or its treatment that produces cachexia or wasting syndrome, seizure disorders, epilepsy, severe muscle spasms, including those characteristic of Crohn’s disease or multiple sclerosis (MS), and muscular dystrophy.
The form in which medical marijuana is offered hardly represents the stereotypical image of weed wrapped up in a cheap plastic bag. The form is a refined marijuana oil pill that can’t be smoked.
Act for Epilepsy co-founder Katie Corkern told the committee about her son, Connor, and his struggle with constant seizures. Corkern, arguing for the addition of epilepsy to the qualifying diseases, said the drug could vastly improve her son’s daily life, who, at age nine, has “run out of options” as far as medication is concerned.
“I shouldn’t have to quit my job and uproot my three children from the only home they’ve ever known, away from their family and friends,” Corkern said. “I should be able to gain access to this lifesaving option, here, in my own home state. Cannabis oil is not a gateway drug, like I’ve heard so many legislators say. It is proven to be medicine that heals.”
Around the same time Wednesday, the House Health and Welfare Committee considered House Bill 1043 by Rep. Tanner Magee, R-Houma, removing the current limit of therapeutic marijuana dispensing pharmacy licenses issued in Louisiana. He temporarily removed the bill from consideration after committee members wanted more consideration.
Currently, the Louisiana Board of Pharmacy is prohibited from granting more than 10 marijuana dispensing pharmacy licenses. Magee’s proposal would eliminate that cap.
“The conversation we’re having today is not about legalization, but how we’re structuring the system we already have in place,” Magee told the committee.