Drug News (International)

Globe and Mail, 18 May 2012 - For years, multiple sclerosis patients have told doctors that smoking marijuana makes them feel better. Now there is research to back up those assertions. The study, published this week in the Canadian Medical Association Journal, found that cannabis eased pain by 50 per cent and reduced spasticity, or muscle stiffness, by 30 per cent.

The Chico News & Review, 17 May 2012 - Ordinance's Flaws Outweigh Its Good Points We're aware that medical-marijuana cultivation often has little or nothing to do with medicine. We also know that marijuana gardens can be a nuisance to neighbors, and that the number of gardens has increased exponentially in recent years. And we understand that Butte County's medical-marijuana-cultivation ordinance is an effort to lessen the nuisance factor.

Porterville Recorder, 17 May 2012 - THE ISSUE County effort to curb illegal marijuana growing. OUR VIEW Laws needed to be strengthened. The new county ordinance which shortens the time a grower of marijuana has to comply with county zoning laws was needed and should help to curb the illegal growing of marijuana in Tulare County.

New York Times, 17 May 2012 - WASHINGTON - A commando-style squad of Drug Enforcement Administration agents accompanied the Honduran counternarcotics police during two firefights with cocaine smugglers in the jungles of the Central American country this month, according to officials in both countries who were briefed on the matter. One of the fights, which occurred last week, left as many as four people dead and has set off a backlash against the American presence there. It remains unclear whether the D.E.A. agents took part in the shooting during either episode, the first in the early hours of May 6 and the second early last Friday. In an initial account of the second episode, the Honduran government told local reporters that two drug traffickers had been killed and a large shipment of cocaine seized; he did not mention any American involvement. Several American officials said the D.E.A. agents did not return fire during the encounter.

Guelph Mercury, 17 May 2012 - GUELPH -- It's hard to walk a street of downtown Guelph without coming across a store selling accessories for smoking marijuana. With intricately blown glass pipes lining the walls, bright lights, and cheerful colours of rolling papers stocking the shelves -- even prominent signage and storefronts, these are not the underground head shops of the 1970s.

Globe and Mail, 16 May 2012 - Ever since the recent Summit of the Americas there has been a lot of chatter among politicians and reporting by the press that the war on drugs is not working. It has been suggested that the hard-line approach to enforcement has been a losing battle and that new strategies need to be considered. Even our Prime Minister is considering other options. I am disappointed that the discussion centres on liberalizing legislation. Nowhere do we hear anything about prevention education.

New Pittsburgh Courier, 16 May 2012 - According to a study of traffic stops along a portion of I-95 in Maryland, African-Americans made up 70 percent of those who were stopped and searched even though they only made up 17 percent of drivers on the road. A similar study of the New Jersey Turnpike found that although African-Americans accounted for only 15 percent of speeding violations, they made up 46 percent of those pulled over. These were only some of the many startling statistics revealed at the "Declaring War on the War on Drugs" Town Hall Meeting on May 11. The event sponsored by the Institute of the Black World 21st Century examined the disparate role of the criminal justice system in the "War on Drugs."

The Athens News, 16 May 2012 - Event Hosted at OU Representatives from across the state came to Ohio University to discuss the logistics behind the legalization of medical marijuana in Ohio Tuesday evening. The four-person panel included representatives from the Alcohol and Drug Abuse Prevention Association of Ohio, the Ohio Medical Cannabis Association (OMCA) and OU Community Standards (formerly Judiciaries). All agreed that marijuana could be beneficial as medicine, but some of the panelists stressed that additional research is needed before it is legalized for medicinal use.

Chilliwack Times, 15 May 2012 - Trial Gives A Behind-thescenes Look At RCMP Raid At 7: 45 a.m., on the morning of Sept. 9, 2009, a loud alarm rang through the trees that ringed the small farm at 7630 Nixon Rd. Up the driveway, past a white quonset hut and inside a two-storey farmhouse, 61-year-old Darryl Francis Ness looked at a video screen. This wasn't the first time the alarm for the property's front gate had been triggered. Over the five-anda-half months Ness had lived in the farmhouse, a bear, coyotes and birds had all set the alarm ringing.

Portland Daily Sun, 15 May 2012 - President Obama tried again to do the right thing and let states alone to regulate and enforce medical marijuana laws, keeping federal law in place in case they're needed to clean up any danger to the industry. For now it looks like the plan is mostly working. California and Colorado have become perps for federal agents to clean out. I'm a liberal Libertarian and proud of our President and his staff, for in a conservative way are successfully being pro-active before people making too much money get more greedy. I have a license, if you will, to purchase legal marijuana when presenting my recommendation for prescription is up to date. I'm 59 years old and have been buying illegal dope with what-all in it from bikers and poor folk and street vendors, sharing between friends. Now I walk out of a store with a tiny lunch bag containing the 8th or a quarter of an ounce of nearly FDA approved, sort of, real clean, no additives, choices between many varieties that each have their own characteristics. My prescription is because of chronic pain.

Canadian Medical Association Journal, 15 May 2012 - Canada's new mandatory minimum sentences for drug offenders are based on "very bad criminal law policy" and constitute a threat to public health as well as the concept of judicial proportionality, former Supreme Court of Canada Justice Louise Arbour says. The law should, and almost certainly will, face a justifiable constitutional challenge, Arbour adds of the omnibus crime legislation, Bill C-10, which received royal assent in March (www.parl.gc.ca/HousePublications/Publication.aspx?DocidT65759&file=4).

cville, 15 May 2012 - In the Weeds A resolution that would have marked a shift in city policy toward prosecuting marijuana possession was ultimately passed by City Council last week as a watered-down request for the state to re-examine its drug policy, but that didn't keep the debate over legalization from raging on.

Daily Press, 15 May 2012 - DISPENSARY, LANDLORD FACE $1,500 DAILY IN FINES HESPERIA With a new medical marijuana dispensary in town, Hesperia officials are touting a tough policy that could hit both the dispensary and its landlord with fines that can reach $1,500 a day after a 24-day warning period.

Washington Post, 15 May 2012 - MARIJUANA MAY HELP RELIEVE MUSCLE TIGHTNESS LINKED TO MULTIPLE SCLEROSIS THE QUESTION Marijuana has been investigated as a medicinal aid for people with cancer, AIDS, glaucoma and other conditions. Might smoking marijuana help relieve the muscle spasticity in people with multiple sclerosis?

Martinsville Bulletin, 14 May 2012 - Still, Two-Thirds Don't Smoke Pot, Say Results of Survey in County The percentage of Henry County Schools high school students who say they smoke marijuana every day has increased dramatically in the last few years, and some other measures of marijuana use also have increased significantly, all mirroring national trends.

Amherst Daily News, 14 May 2012 - Cannabis Crusader Has Been in Europe Since 2009 AMHERST - A series of drug charges against an Athol man who says he's exiled in Europe have been withdrawn. Rickey Logan Simpson, 62, was charged with the production of cannabis marijuana, possession of cannabis marijuana for the purpose of trafficking and possession of cannabis marijuana and possession of cannabis resin following a raid of his Athol Road home in November 2009. Simpson was in Amsterdam, Holland accepting the Freedom Fighter of the Year Award at the annual Cannabis Cup when the raid occurred and it's believe he has been in Europe since then.

Toronto Star, 14 May 2012 - A former drug squad officer accused of beating a Montreal stripper in a Toronto police interview room says he didn't have any contact with her. Aida Fagundo has testified that a tall, good-looking police officer with blue eyes beat her with a telephone book after she was arrested on a cocaine trafficking charge on Nov. 2, 1997.

Charlottesville Daily Progress, 14 May 2012 - The Charlottesville City Council has shown its willingness to push the envelope on marijuana policy, but Central Virginia's representatives in Richmond seem uneager to follow suit. The City Council broke new ground last week by calling on state lawmakers to rethink penalties for pot possession and give "due consideration" to legislation that would decriminalize, legalize or regulate marijuana like alcohol.

Summit Daily News, 14 May 2012 - Authorities: Pure form of the drug may be coming from Mexico A recent upswing in the number of heroin overdoses in Summit County may be the result of a purer batch of the drug circulating here, authorities say.

The Dartmouth, 14 May 2012 - Policymakers, doctors and professors from across New England debated the merits and pitfalls of legalizing medical marijuana at the eighth annual Dartmouth Symposium on Substance Abuse, held on Friday in Collis Common Ground. The conference - "Medical Marijuana: Compassionate Care or Oxymoron?" - examined the controversial issue of medical marijuana in the context of a current bill facing the New Hampshire legislature. The symposium aimed to provide an informed, scientific discussion of the topic and sought to eliminate politicized arguments, according to Seddon Savage, director of the Dartmouth Center on Addiction, Recovery and Education and the event organizer.