Kennedy rails against new medical marijuana law
By K.C. Myers, Cape Cod Times
WEST BARNSTABLE — It doesn’t take a National Institutes of Health study to realize more marijuana in the marketplace, combined with the profit motive, will lead to more addiction, former U.S. Rep. Patrick Kennedy said at a presentation Friday at Cape Cod Community College.
So, Kennedy said, he hopes people won’t “leave their common sense at the door” when it comes to understanding the danger posed by the state’s new medical marijuana law.
Kennedy and Kevin Sabet, a former drug policy adviser in the Obama administration, founded the national group Smart Approaches to Marijuana. Both were scheduled to be at the program at the college, which was sponsored by the Cape-based nonprofit Freedom from Addiction, but Sabet canceled, citing commitments in Washington.
In November, Massachusetts voters passed a referendum making marijuana legal with a doctor’s prescription. It allows those with prescriptions to possess 10 ounces of marijuana every two months — enough for up to 1,200 joints, according to statistics from the group founded by Kennedy and Sabet.
The Massachusetts law allows too much marijuana, Kennedy said. He showed glitzy marketing posters for clinics in states that legalize some form of medical marijuana. They were come-ons to patients with catchy slogans, such as “the doctor is in.”
He believes that medical marijuana is just a step to total legalization. A campaign to make marijuana legal is coming in 2016 to Massachusetts, he said.
“(Medical marijuana) is a way to build momentum,” he added.
Kennedy, the son of Joan and the late U.S. Sen. Edward M. Kennedy, has a personal history with mental illness and addiction.
He said he has been diagnosed with bipolar disorder and has suffered from addiction, and was even “doctor shopping” to get OxyContin.
Kennedy admitted to going to treatment for addiction and being arrested for operating under the influence in 2006 in Washington, D.C.
But he was re-elected and was the main sponsor of the Mental Health Parity and Addiction Equity Act — which aimed to require insurance to cover mental health and substance abuse treatment the way it covers physical illness.
He left public office in 2010 to found The Next Frontier Campaign: One Mind for Research, to raise awareness and funding for mental health and brain research.
The goal, he said, is to have “the head treated as part of the body.”
Only about 30 people attended Kennedy’s talk, but they had many different perspectives.
Mickey Martin, director of T-Comp, a consulting business offering “solutions for the emerging industry of cannabis medicines” held up a series of posters including, “I smoke weed and I’m a good person.” Martin, now a California resident, hopes to set up business in Cambridge.
Martin called out a few times during Kennedy’s presentation and then they got into a lengthy back-and-fourth at the end. Legalizing marijuana would prevent jails from filling with people arrested for marijuana possession, Martin argued.
Harwich Police Chief William Mason, also in the audience, said his officers haven’t put anyone “in the slammer for a roach” or any amount of pot under an ounce in 13 years.
The last marijuana bust resulting in an arrest was for 6,000 pounds, he said.
The department doesn’t care about small amounts of marijuana, Mason said. “We are just too busy.”
Debbie Saucier, an outreach coordinator with Community Support Associates Inc., said she works with brain-injured patients, some of whom are waiting for the chance to get marijuana prescriptions to ease their pain and other symptoms.
About 25 percent of her patients have mental-health problems, such as anxiety and depression, she said. Many of them use the drug, she said, but “they absolutely should not be smoking marijuana.”
Shelley Stormo, who works with families at the addiction treatment facility Gosnold on Cape Cod, said she suffered from migraines, and years ago was a medical marijuana patient for a year in California.
Marijuana really helped her when no other medicine could, she said.
Stormo said the commonwealth’s law was well thought-out and could serve as a model to control abuse and help sick patients, she said.
Kennedy said his interest in fighting medical marijuana is to prevent more addiction.
“If this was really about medical treatment, it would be sold at a pharmacy,” Kennedy said. “How many doctors would tell their patients to go smoke opium for their pain?”