Tell me -- not again, but for the first time -- why it is dispensaries are created to distribute medical marijuana? Why cannot marijuana be distributed through pharmacies, same as any other prescription?
The Utah Senate has approved a medical marijuana bill. And, I read how it calls for the creation of dispensaries. (The Utah House now takes up the bill.)
Is it to hold the cost down? Is the thought, that if pharmaceutical companies are involved, they will raise the cost? My reply to that, is that just because pharmacies are used, doesn't mean the product cannot come from the same source as it would if dispensaries are used.
Actually, in theory, it would seem pharmacies might result in less expense. There is less overhead. The same pharmacist that gives you all your other prescriptions, gives you your marijuana. There is no need for adding new middle men.
Then, is the need for dispensaries one of convenience? Do we want dispensaries just so medical marijuana will be easier to obtain? I cannot imagine there being more dispensaries than there are pharmacies, so that would seem to be questionable reasoning.
Unless the dispensaries were located right next to doctors who commonly prescribed marijuana. And, that brings up another question: In states where marijuana is approved for medical use, is the business scattered evenly among all doctors, or do some doctors cater to the marijuana business, specializing in it?
I see danger in that. If a doctor's living is dependent on how many marijuana prescriptions he/she can issue, he/she is going to have incentive to "supply" marijuana to people.
Another potential problem:Since marijuana is a pain medication, and since it is hard to dispute whether someone is in pain, it becomes that anyone can walk into the doctor's office, say they have pain, and walk out with a prescription for marijuana.
These are problems other states might be facing. I do not know. I only know, if Utah is to allow medical marijuana, it should find a Utah solution. We should not simply rubber stamp what is being done in other states. We should take measures to ensure that doctors do not become dependent on the marijuana segment of their business. We should take steps to ensure people cannot simply walk in, say they are in pain, and walk out with a prescription when their real aim is to use the marijuana for recreation.
So, I would suggest a few things:
(1.) Use pharmacies, not dispensaries.
(2.) Make it unlawful for a doctor to derive more than, say, 20 percent of his/ her business from marijuana prescriptions.
(3.) Make is a crime to prescribe marijuana if you know the patient will just be using it for recreation. Yes, this would be hard to enforce, but at least you are curbing the danger by making it illegal.
(4.) Make it unlawful for a patient to obtain marijuana under false pretenses, to feign a malady or to feign pain in order to win a prescription.
(5.) Make it unlawful to fill a prescription without diagnosing a malady. And, that malady must be one that typically brings enough pain to justify a pain prescription such as marijuana.
(6.) Prohibit the doctor from prescribing more medicine (marijuana) than needed for the time frame the malady normally lasts. And, require the doctor to reevaluate the malady each time he/she does a refill.
These solutions will not totally cover the problems. But, at least they are partial safeguards. If you can see the danger of abuses, at least make those abuses illegal. These things will not stop the person needing medical marijuana from getting it, but they might stop others from getting it when they shouldn't.
(Edited Feb. 27)
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