For more than 50 years, the US government has cut out the legs of cannabis research. Scientists and cannabis research advocates assert that the US government’s stance on the topic has hamstrung in-depth studies of marijuana and the development of beneficial drugs from its compounds.
Until recently, US Cannabis researchers had been relegated to a single source for their testing material: a University of Mississippi facility that held a contract with the National Institute on Drug Abuse (NIDA) to provide cannabis to researchers. Keep in mind, this cannabis has been approved for use in academic research and not for clinical drug trials or pharmaceutical research and development. It is still the Drug Enforcement Administration’s (DEA) position that cannabis is a schedule 1 narcotic and drugs of this designation are defined as: “a high potential for abuse…no currently accepted medical treatment use in the U.S…. a lack of accepted safety for use under medical supervision.”
This month, the Drug Enforcement Administration announced it will enable American cannabis producers to provide cannabis for research purposes using a system of licensures.
It is researchers’ hope that this new development will usher in a new age of cannabis research to better understand the plant’s effects and potential therapeutic uses.
Executive director of the Multidisciplinary Association for Psychedelic Studies (MAPS) Rick Doblin is optimistic in light of the new development, stating, “This is a momentous decision. This is the last political obstruction of research with Schedule 1 drugs.”
MAPS has led research into the potential benefits of drugs currently classified as Schedule 1 by the United States Drug Enforcement Agency (DEA).
Around one-third of citizens live in a state with a legalized cannabis industries. 30 states currently have medical marijuana legislation in place that makes the plant and derivative compounds available to patients with qualifying conditions. Despite these facts, due to federal law, researchers and scientists are not able to procure research samples from States’ licensed dispensaries.
The topic has been a point of contention for researchers and business owners in the cannabis industry alike. Psychiatry professor and director of the Center for Medicinal Cannabis Research at the University of California, San Diego Dr. Igor Grant calls the impasse, “a big disconnect”.
Despite the recent DEA decision, a resolution between state and federal laws regarding cannabis laws remains to be seen. With few avenues for scientists to use in procuring samples of cannabis products and strains, their research continues to be hampered.
Fortunately, the recent development signals a turning point for cannabis research as well as private industry. Groff North America (GNA) is one of three companies recently awarded initial approval to provide cannabis to research entities. Dr. Steve Groff, founder and chairman of GNA had a positive outlook on where things are going for cannabis research, stating, “We’ll see a decade or more of explosive cannabis research and potential new therapies.”
The government’s monopoly, and barriers, on cannabis research source materials has left researchers with inferior samples from which to conduct their research. Modern cannabis is far more refined, varied, and potent, while the “’68” samples have remained largely unchanged for decades.
Cannabis researcher and president of the Scottsdale Research Institute Dr. Sue Sisley also received initial approval to cultivate marijuana for research. On the subject of narrow cannabis research opportunities and very few samples from which to conduct her research, she had this to say, “There are thousands of different cannabis varieties that all have unique chemical profiles and produce unique clinical effects, but we didn’t have access to that normal diversity.” She described the Mississippi university source material as “anemic” greenish powder. She would go on to elaborate that “It’s very difficult to overcome the placebo effect when you have something that diluted.”
It was not until 2016 that government policy began to shift away from a position of stagnation to one of advancement. Dr. Sisley’s recent research on the effects of cannabis and its ability to abate the symptoms of PTSD were largely inconclusive, despite spanning 10 years and involving 76 individuals. Her peer Dr. Grant at UCSD succinctly summarized their quandary, stating “We don’t have enough research on the kind of marijuana products that people in the real world are using.”
Researchers have gone so far as to import their cannabis samples from abroad. The practice is surprisingly legal, though noticeably counterintuitive. While the method of diversification of source material has kept research moving at an amble, it has plenty of opportunities for difficulty and hurdles to overcome.
While the NIDA has a monopoly more or less still in place, the new change will certainly have lasting impacts on how cannabis research is conducted and how domestic producers can deliver quality samples into the hands of researchers.
The newly licensed producers will create an estimated 5,000 pounds annually for research purposes. Not only will these samples come from varied regions and include flowers from Sativa, Indica, and Hybrid varieties, producers will also be able to provide researchers with customized orders to fit specific research criteria.
The flood gates may well soon be open for new academic research, pharmaceutical development, and biotechnology companies’ R&D activities as they relate to cannabis. However, there will still be hurdles to overcome for many in the space. Namely, recreational industries and their respective producers are moving quickly to develop newer and more potent strains to fit their audience’s tastes at a rate that far outpaces the research community. Licensing to conduct such research is slow to be approved, too. Essentially, science is getting a new lease on cannabis research, but they’re still playing catch-up in terms of chasing the newest developments in cannabis from a recreational perspective. This puts a hindrance on cannabis researchers, who by comparison are lagging behind researchers’ schedule 1 counterparts and other drugs, like MDMA and Psilocybin.
