WHAT’S POT?
How would rescheduling impact NM’s burgeoning cannabis industry? It depends on whom you ask
When you ask Duke Rodriguez, the president and CEO of Ultra Health, one of the state’s largest cannabis companies, what a potential rescheduling of marijuana at the federal level can do to New Mexico’s industry, he’ll give you an hourlong presentation on how that can play out.
He’ll say, for instance, that the local industry reaction will be to dismiss the realistic threats rescheduling could bring, such as a potential pharmacy model — upending the retail model that has created a saturated market in the state. And, with that estimation, “it has a high probability of giving a rebirth to the medical program,” said Rodriguez, who’s been a critic in recent years of dwindling patient numbers in the state medical cannabis program.
“We haven’t seen a rescheduling of this magnitude in decades,” Rodriguez said. “There are two sides to this coin. Imagine if pharmacies were to dispense cannabis. It would likely be packaged differently; you would see blister packs, pre-measured, dosage-specific. Besides all the labeling and all the safety standards that might be enhanced, it very likely would have to address the issue of medical coverage.”
The potential rescheduling of marijuana from Schedule I to Schedule III by the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration, or DEA, following a review from the federal Department of Health and Human Services, or HHS, has raised questions at a national level throughout the industry about what this can mean. And it has, on a local level, done much of the same.
But Dale Tinker, the outgoing executive director of the New Mexico Pharmacists Association, thinks it’s too soon to tell what rescheduling can mean from a pharmaceutical perspective, and that industry’s potential crossover into cannabis. But he said his first thought is that “it’s not really going to change the practice of pharmacy.”
Schedule I substances include “drugs with no currently accepted medical use and a high potential for abuse” such as heroin, according to the DEA. And Schedule III substances typically have low to moderate potential for abuse, and include ketamine, anabolic steroids and testosterone.
Marijuana has been listed as a Schedule I substance since the 1970s.
“My thought is that for it to be a prescription, it has to be FDA-approved. And cannabis is still not an FDA-approved drug product,” said Tinker, whose organization has more than 500 members. “It would have to go through clinical trials and be offered through one of the drug companies, manufacturers — or whoever makes it would have to go through the FDA process, which is long and expensive.”
Asked what some of the thoughts are from pharmacists locally on marijuana rescheduling, Tinker said, “Generally, pharmacists would like to see it become a Schedule III (drug).”
“Most pharmacists are already becom
ing educated on talking to patients about drug interactions,” Tinker added. “It won’t do away with the state law authorizing medical cannabis that will stay in place, at least in my opinion. And then the recreational cannabis that’s already approved, I think it’ll take some pressure off of people in terms of the legality of providing cannabis to their (customers).”
The review from HHS looked at certain determinants in making its recommendation, including abuse potential, medical use and psychological and physiological dependence. Rodriguez said those determinants are likely the reasons why marijuana will be rescheduled.
“What they said is there can be some dependence-related issues, with the most common side effects being irritability, anxiousness, sleeplessness,” he said. “All of the ‘weed is dangerous,’ ‘reefer madness,’ they set all those things aside and basically said they were untrue and a myth. That’s huge.”
Rodriguez, whose Bernalillo-based company boasts more than three dozen dispensaries across New Mexico, also pointed to the medical use cited by federal scientists — for anorexia, anxiety, pain and post-traumatic stress disorder, and said they “identified mixed findings” of effectiveness across some indications. But while they said some data was inconclusive and some favorable, they said the “largest evidence base for effectiveness exists for marijuana use within the pain indication (in particular, neuropathic pain).”
Jacob Vigil, an associate professor with the University of New Mexico’s Department of Psychology, has studied the effects of cannabis over the years, including its relationship with helping reduce opioid use. He said cannabis never really fit into the Schedule I category — where it has remained for decades — because it does not have “evidence of tremendous negative side effects” like that of other similarly scheduled drugs.
“Opioids are toxic — they’re the leading cause of death for middle-aged people and young people in the United States,” Vigil said. “And cannabis doesn’t have any toxicity, meaning that there are no known studies that evidence damage to bodily organs with excessive use of cannabis.”
Vigil said rescheduling cannabis is a long time coming and that it can mean an additional layer of legitimacy for the plant and its medical efficacy. But he said it also can potentially strip stringent research licensing from the DEA, which can open up the door for more cannabis research.
In January, a group of attorneys general led by Colorado’s Phil Weiser sent a letter to the DEA supporting the department’s recommendation — which came on the same day the report was released by cannabis attorneys — to reschedule cannabis from Schedule I to Schedule III. But New Mexico Attorney General Raúl Torrez was not a signatory on that letter, and his spokeswoman Lauren Rodriguez said his office has no record of being contacted to sign the letter, though his office supports it.
In an email to the Journal, Lauren Rodriguez said cannabis rescheduling would not affect state laws regulating things like possession, distribution and consumption. But she said it could have a positive effect on local businesses.
“... It would likely make it easier for New Mexico businesses operating in this space to access capital and organize their operations across state lines,” she said. “More importantly, it would allow for greater research into the health and safety side effects of cannabis, something that is difficult to do while the substance is listed in Schedule I of the Controlled Substances Act.”
Ben Lewinger, executive director of the New Mexico Cannabis Chamber of Commerce, said the organization supports descheduling marijuana entirely.
He said rescheduling marijuana could be a net positive with the potential removal of the IRS Code Section 280E, which disallows marijuana businesses from deducting a majority of typical business expenses because of the current scheduling of cannabis and leads to heavier tax bills. But that point is just a “red herring and distraction” from authentic cannabis decriminalization, he added.
“Shifting to Schedule III would open up cannabis to big pharma and does nothing for folks still incarcerated for cannabis offenses or expunge criminal records relating to nonviolent cannabis charges,” Lewinger said. “Our fear is that rescheduling, while it seems like a step in the right direction, could push back true legalization for several years, if not decades.”
He added: “Our organization participates in several conversations at the national level, and there are more questions than answers. Would the FDA regulate state-run cannabis programs? Would existing patents on cannabis and cannabinoids, including those owned by the U.S. government, make it impossible for New Mexico cannabis businesses to carry some products? Would federal taxes and fees be more than any tax savings from alleviating 280E requirements?”