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Congress in action tomorrow..."Key House Committee Will Vote On Marijuana Research Bill For Veterans This Week":
November 2, 2021

A congressional committee is scheduled to vote on a bill on Thursday that would require the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) to conduct clinical trials into the therapeutic potential of marijuana for military veterans.

The House Veterans’ Affairs Committee will hold a markup of the legislation from Rep. Lou Correa (D-CA). His bill, the VA Medicinal Cannabis Research Act, would mandate that the department launch a series of studies on using medical marijuana to treat PTSD and chronic pain. Earlier versions of the measure cleared the panel in 2020 and 2018 but were not enacted into law.

The new action this week comes a month after a subcommittee held a hearing on the proposal, with the Biden administration expressing opposition to the reform.

Correa said at the time that his bill is “a pragmatic and bipartisan piece of legislation that would advance our understanding of the impacts of medicinal cannabis usage and could improve the lives of veterans and other Americans.”

But a VA representative pushed back on the proposal, saying any clinical trials involving human subjects that carries potential risks must use the “smallest number of participants needed to avoid unnecessarily putting subjects at risk.”

With respect to marijuana, some effects “are not known,” VA’s David Carroll said, “thus a circumscribed approach to determine dose, administration modality and best outcome measure must be shown in a proof-of-concept approach to ensure the validity of the research.”

Additionally, Carroll argued that certain requirements stipulated in the bill such as studying seven different cannabis varieties are “not consistent with the current state of scientific evidence, which suggests that smaller, early phase, controlled clinical trials with a focused set of specific aims are optimal to determine proof of concept for using cannabis to treat specific conditions.”

VA is “already dedicating resources and research expertise to study the effects of cannabis on conditions affecting veterans,” Carroll said in the subcommittee hearing—though advocates and key lawmakers don’t view those ongoing studies as sufficient.

The department’s response to the bill is consistent with its past testimony—but it still comes as a disappointment to advocates who had hoped VA under Biden would ultimately embrace the modest reform.

Hopes were raised even higher after the bill sponsor, Correa, recently informed a separate House panel that he’d had a conversation with VA Secretary Denis McDonough about the issue of marijuana and veterans. Groups that represent military veterans, meanwhile, have backed the legislation.

The bill says the VA secretary “shall carry out a series of clinical trials on the effects of medical-grade cannabis on the health outcomes of covered veterans diagnosed with chronic pain and covered veterans diagnosed with post-traumatic stress disorder.”

https://www.marijuanamoment.net/key-house-committee-will-vote-on-marijuana-research-bill-for-veterans-this-week/