{"id":60601,"date":"2023-01-11T06:22:37","date_gmt":"2023-01-11T14:22:37","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/2023\/01\/11\/kentucky-senate-president-open-to-medical-marijuana-on-a-limited-basis-with-restrictions\/"},"modified":"2023-01-11T17:45:42","modified_gmt":"2023-01-12T01:45:42","slug":"kentucky-senate-president-open-to-medical-marijuana-on-a-limited-basis-with-restrictions","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/2023\/01\/11\/kentucky-senate-president-open-to-medical-marijuana-on-a-limited-basis-with-restrictions\/","title":{"rendered":"Kentucky Senate President Open To Medical Marijuana On A Limited Basis, With Restrictions"},"content":{"rendered":"<\/p>\n

\u201cI am working with others see how we could get to a \u2018yes\u2019 to take care of those who are at the end of life.\u201d<\/em><\/p>\n

By Al Cross, Kentucky Health News<\/strong><\/p>\n

State Senate President Robert Stivers (R) suggested Monday night that he might be willing to approve medical marijuana in Kentucky on a very limited basis, to relieve patients\u2019 pain at the end of their lives. But he cast fresh doubt on whether relief actually comes from cannabis, or rather from expectation that it will.<\/p>\n

\u201cI am working with others see how we could get to a \u2018yes\u2019 to take care of those who are at the end of life,\u201d Stivers said on KET\u2019s \u201cKentucky Tonight.\u201d It was the first sign of compromise on the issue from Stivers, who has been the major obstacle to medical-cannabis bills passed by the state House.<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019ve seen family members go through cancer treatments; in no way do I want to be unsympathetic,\u201d Stivers said as he began discussing the issue. After repeating his desire to see more research on it and making other points, he said the use of cannabis in palliative care can easily be defended under the old \u201cchoice of evils\u201d principle of English common law. In such cases, \u201cI don\u2019t think you would ever be arrested; I don\u2019t think you would be convicted,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

A Manchester attorney, Stivers briefly noted without explanation a National Geographic story published online January 6. It cited a study that found \u201c67 percent of the relief from pain reported by people treated with cannabinoids was also seen among those who received a placebo,\u201d Meryl Davids Landau wrote for the magazine. \u201cThis suggests that the pain reduction was not due primarily to compounds found in cannabis but to people\u2019s expectations that it would help. And that positive expectation was based in part, say the authors, on over-enthusiastic media coverage. Reputable studies so far have not found that cannabinoids sufficiently reduce pain, which led the International Association for the Study of Pain in 2021 to decline to endorse these drugs.\u201d<\/p>\n

Even as he cast new doubt, Stivers suggested<\/a> what a medical cannabis system could look like. He said the state could require names of all owners of cannabis dispensaries to be public, \u201cto prevent abuse,\u201d and have a computer network to monitor cannabis prescriptions and how the drug is ingested, saying marijuana smoke has 50 percent more carcinogens than tobacco smoke.<\/p>\n

Last year, after the Senate again declined to take up a House bill that would have legalized medical marijuana, Stivers pushed through a bill for cannabis research at the University of Kentucky. \u201cThere\u2019s indicators out there that certain things are helped,\u201d he said on KET. \u201cLet\u2019s research the issue.\u201d<\/p>\n

After last year\u2019s legislative session, Gov. Andy Beshear (D) named a group to study the issue, then used his pardon power in an executive order allowing people with a medical provider\u2019s statement saying they have at least one of 21 specified medical conditions to possess up to eight ounces of cannabis for medical purposes in Kentucky, if bought legally in another state.<\/p>\n

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The @KYGOP<\/a> Senate leader thinks you might deserve safe, effective pain relief\u2014but only if you’re dying.<\/p>\n

This is an insult to Kentuckians who need care now. @KYSenatePres<\/a> should stop playing politics and work with Gov. Beshear to legalize medical cannabis.https:\/\/t.co\/8A3cq2HrVo<\/a><\/p>\n

\u2014 Kentucky Democrats (@KyDems) January 10, 2023<\/a><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

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Cannabis is not legal in Indiana and Tennessee, and the medical-cannabis laws of Ohio and West Virginia do not apply to out-of-state residents. Missouri and Virginia have passed laws to legalize cannabis for recreational use, but the Missouri law is not expected to take effect until at least February, and Virginia is not expected to have cannabis dispensaries until next year. That means Illinois is the only bordering state where Kentuckians can use Beshear\u2019s order.<\/p>\n

Beshear, a Democrat seeking re-election, says the better alternative to Illinois would be passage of a medical cannabis law by Kentucky\u2019s Republican-controlled legislature. But leaders in the two chambers disagree on which one should deal with the legislation first; House leaders say it should start in the Senate, since their chamber has passed it twice, but Senate Majority Floor Leader Damon Thayer (R) of Georgetown says the House should still go first. Stivers did not give his opinion on that point during the KET program, which touched on several legislative issues.<\/p>\n

Some Democratic House members want the legislature to offer voters a constitutional amendment on the issue, but Stivers said some of the UK research \u201cwill be back before the constitutional amendment could even go on the ballot\u201d in November 2024.<\/p>\n

This story was first published by Kentucky Health News<\/a>,\u00a0an independent news service of the Institute for Rural Journalism and Community Issues, based in the School of Journalism and Media at the University of Kentucky, with support from the Foundation for a Healthy Kentucky.\u00a0<\/em><\/p>\n

\n

New Jersey Governor Touts Marijuana Industry Growth In State Of State Address, With Cannabis Business Exec As Guest<\/a><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

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The post Kentucky Senate President Open To Medical Marijuana On A Limited Basis, With Restrictions<\/a> appeared first on Marijuana Moment<\/a>.<\/p>\n


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\nRead More: Kentucky Senate President Open To Medical Marijuana On A Limited Basis, With Restrictions<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

\u201cI am working with others see how we could get to a \u2018yes\u2019 to take care of those who are at the end of life.\u201d By Al Cross, Kentucky Health News State Senate President Robert Stivers (R) suggested Monday night that he might be willing to approve medical marijuana inContinue Reading<\/a><\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":457,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"false","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[18,81],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/60601"}],"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\/457"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=60601"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/60601\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":60602,"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/60601\/revisions\/60602"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=60601"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=60601"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=60601"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}