On February 16, MAPS President Rick Doblin met with Joe St. Laurent and Scott Goodrich, the founders of Chemic Labs, the analytical laboratory that has conducted prior MAPS/CaNORML-funded vaporizer research. They discussed the development of a new vaporizer research protocol to submit to NIDA for review, once again seeking to purchase 10 grams from NIDA and seeking DEA permission to import 10 grams of high THC/high CBD marijuana from the Netherlands, with a cannabinoid content that NIDA doesn’t have available. The design work and the study itself, should we eventually obtain approval from NIDA, will be co-funded by MAPS and CaNORML, as have all our previous vaporizer research projects.
This new protocol seeks to analyze the constituents of the vapor produced in the Volcano vaporizer, from samples of NIDA marijuana that contain THC and samples of imported marijuana that contain both THC and CBD. During the meeting at Chemic, we reviewed in detail the critiques of the original vaporizer research protocol that the PHS/NIDA reviewers offered back in August 2005. We will make a few changes in the protocol so that this will be a new submission and we will respond in detail to each critique. The proposed methodology will call for testing at various temperatures, and will measure for carbon monoxide levels, cannabinoids and certain particulates.
PHS/NIDA’s handling of the original version of this protocol was another classic case of the dysfunctional nature of NIDA’s monopoly on research-grade marijuana. After waiting for more than two years for PHS/NIDA to review the protocol, during which time we unsuccessfully sued NIDA for unreasonable delay in the DC Circuit Court of Appeals, the critique that was finally issued contained several important misunderstandings and seemed to come from people who had barely even read the protocol. Chemic filed a response to the critiques in September 2005, which PHS/NIDA has totally ignored for more than 17 months. There seems to be no appeal process at all in the PHS/NIDA review of medical marijuana research proposals and there are certainly no deadlines that compel PHS/NIDA to respond within any reasonable period of time. This is in contrast to FDA, which must reply to protocol submissions within 30 days and has a clearly defined and prompt appeal process.
The new vaporizer protocol will be submitted to NIDA in April. Then, we anticipate a long wait. NIDA has successfully ignored Chemic’s response to its critiques but it will be more difficult for NIDA to ignore a new protocol submission.
