Editorial: Dying over drug politics

Past time to resolve conflict

Thursday, May 22, 2008

The conflict over state and federal medical marijuana laws must be resolved.

California and 12 other states now allow the use of medical marijuana, yet the federal government does not.

That means sick people with authorization from their doctors to use marijuana are still in legal jeopardy, that California employers can fire workers who use marijuana recommended by a physician, and that people in need of an organ transplant can be barred from organ-transplant waiting lists.

Too bad there is not a common-sense transplant.

The Star wrote last month about a Seattle man, Timothy Garon, denied a spot on an organ-transplant list because he had used medical marijuana, authorized by his physician, for symptoms related to Hepatitis C.

The University of Washington Medical Center, which has strict rules about organ recipients' drug use, denied Mr. Garon a shot at a new liver, in part, because marijuana is illegal under federal law.

He died May 1.

Now, the University of Washington Medical Center is using the same sorry reason to deny a spot on its organ-transplant list to Jonathon Simchen, 33, of Seattle, according to a May 19 article in The Los Angeles Times.

The Times reported Mr. Simchen, a diabetic with failing kidneys and pancreas, was also denied a spot in Seattle's Virginia Mason Hospital transplant program because of his use of medical marijuana.

Mr. Simchen cannot afford to wait for Congress to get around to resolving the state-federal law conflict. It has already been three years since the U.S. Supreme Court recommended that Congress act.

However, medical centers do not have to base life-and-death decisions on the federal government's inane, outdated 1970s drug-war policies.

There is no reason why, in 2008, marijuana is listed as a Schedule 1 drug, meaning it is deemed to have no medical use, when drugs such as cocaine and morphine are listed as Schedule 2 drugs, available by prescription.

Medical-marijuana use, authorized by a physician, should never be a reason for denying anyone a shot at receiving a life-saving organ transplant. Indeed, people in need of organ transplants are some of the most-likely people to benefit from medical marijuana.

We understand there might be political risks to a member of Congress who takes this on. What we don't understand is why any physician would put politics before patients.

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