Back in February, CJ Harris was good enough at football to play at an elite college. Harris didn\u2019t get a scholarship to Auburn University, but after receiving word that he\u2019d be welcome to campus as a \u201cpreferred walk-on,\u201d he was near-guaranteed a spot on the team \u2014 and, possibly, the opportunity to play for a scholarship.<\/p>\n
This was significant \u2014 both for Harris and for medical cannabis in Georgia, for which he\u00a0served as a convenient and ideal poster child<\/a>.<\/p>\n Seizures increasing in frequency had jeopardized Harris\u2019s early athletics career until Georgia lawmakers legalized high CBD oil<\/a> as a treatment. The drug worked, as it has for many others, and allowed Harris to play well enough for Warner Robins High School to get the friendly nod from Auburn.<\/p>\n Now it\u2019s May, and Harris, who graduated from Warner Robins this week, is still good enough at football \u2014 but he won\u2019t be playing at Auburn. Not Auburn, and not anywhere else.<\/p>\n According to a version of a story that\u2019s been picked up by CNN,<\/a>\u00a0Harris was informed by Auburn coaches that the cannabis oil \u2014 his use of which had been publicized by a state lawmaker back in Georgia \u2014 means he\u2019s ineligible to play college football.<\/p>\n WATCH: @CurtisJavonHar5<\/a> has been seizure-free for well over a year thanks to cannabis oil \u2014 its the only medicine that\u2019s worked for him so far. Now, the medicine that keeps Harris out of the hospital is also keeping him off an NCAA football field. pic.twitter.com\/vrRiOhWcNl<\/a><\/p>\n \u2014 Cam Gaskins (@CamWGXA) May 24, 2018<\/a><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n According to WGXA, a CNN affiliate in Georgia,<\/a>\u00a0Harris\u2019s father was informed by Auburn\u2019s medical staff that his son\u2019s cannabis-oil treatment renders him unable to play.<\/p>\n It\u2019s unclear whether this was because of requisite drug tests. CBD oil has less than 0.3 percent THC, the threshold that determines whether the\u00a0cannabis sativa\u00a0plant qualifies as hemp or marijuana, in the eyes of the law.\u00a0According to the most recent copy of the NCAA\u2019s drug-testing guidelines<\/a>, a positive drug test for cannabis is the presence of 15 nanograms of THC metabolites per milliliter of urine (15 ng\/ml).<\/p>\n It doesn\u2019t appear that Harris has been drug-tested, but this appears to be the NCAA\u2019s logic: high-CBD, low-THC cannabis oil \u2014 a neuroprotectant that preliminary studies have shown\u00a0has value in treating brain injuries<\/a>, which are health problems common to football players \u2014 is not appropriate for a football player to use.<\/p>\n \u201cWhile the NCAA committee that oversees health and safety issues has discussed medical marijuana and CBD products at recent meetings, it has not recommended changes to NCAA policy,\u201d NCAA spokesman Christopher Radford\u00a0told the Ledger-Enquirer<\/a>. \u201cThis means that THC is still classified as a banned drug for student-athletes.\u201d And, thus, not an allowed medication for a college football player.<\/p>\n Harris stayed buoyant and positive, as befits a teenager who quotes the Bible on his Twitter page. He told reporters he\u2019s looking for junior colleges or other programs outside of NCAA rules and left the chorus of outrage for others. Former NCAA coaches, epilepsy advocacy groups, and others have all blasted Harris\u2019s reversal of fortune.<\/p>\n On Wednesday, Auburn coach Gus Malzahn added more confusion to the matter by claiming that Harris\u2019s eligible-ineligible progression had nothing to do with marijuana, but that he simply \u201cwasn\u2019t cleared by our medical staff,\u201d according to the Ledger-Inquirer.<\/p>\n \u201cIt didn\u2019t have anything to do with anything else like some people reported,\u201d added Malzhan, who didn\u2019t offer a specific counter-narrative.<\/p>\n Something doesn\u2019t quite add up.\u00a0When reached by TMZ<\/a>, Curtis Harris, CJ\u2019s father, didn\u2019t specify the exact reason why Auburn changed their minds. But, luckily for our purposes, the NCAA\u2019s intractability makes for a convenient villain. Despite\u00a0reports of upwards of 60 percent<\/a>\u00a0of student-athletes smoking cannabis on their off-hours, something being upfront and honest about their medical marijuana use is an easy mark.<\/p>\n Auburn still has to fully explain its decision, and Curtis Harris\u2019s sudden taciturn turn in his TMZ interview begs further questions.<\/p>\n But the message is clear: if you\u2019re an \u201cout\u201d medical-marijuana patient, you can forget about the NCAA. This will just mean fewer athletes willing to go public \u2014 and, possibly, a few more willing to further sacrifice their health\u00a0to help the NCAA bank $1.1 billion a year.<\/a><\/p>\n TELL US<\/strong>,\u00a0do you think football players should be able to take cannabis oil?<\/p>\n The post Forget the NFL, the NCAA\u2019s Marijuana Policy Might Be Worse<\/a> appeared first on Cannabis Now<\/a>.<\/p>\n
Back in February, CJ Harris was good enough at football to play at an elite college. Harris didn\u2019t get a scholarship to Auburn University, but after receiving word that he\u2019d be welcome to campus as a \u201cpreferred walk-on,\u201d he was near-guaranteed a spot on the team \u2014 and, possibly, theContinue Reading<\/a><\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":9,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"false","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[50,2069,136,1302,4468,4469,657,4470,90,4471,969,420],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/26630"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/9"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=26630"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/26630\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":26631,"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/26630\/revisions\/26631"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=26630"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=26630"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=26630"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}\n
\nThe NCAA\u2019s Marijuana Policy<\/h4>\n
The Confusion Around CJ Harris\u2019s Case<\/h4>\n
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\nRead More: Forget the NFL, the NCAA\u2019s Marijuana Policy Might Be Worse<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"