On June 18, 2009, the Governor's Office received an appeal from Mr. John Worthington relating to the Department of Health Pharmacy Board's denial of a petition to repeal or amend WAC 246-887-100. The Governor denied the Petition on July 29, 2009.
DATE: July 30, 2009
Martin C. Loesch
Senior Advisor and
General Counsel to the Governor
July 29, 2009
John Worthington
4500 S.E. 2nd Place
Renton, WA 98059
Re: Administrative Rule Appeal - Marijuana Rescheduling
Dear Mr. Worthington:
The Board of Pharmacy (Board) denied your petition to repeal
or amend WAC 246-887-100 to reschedule marijuana on June 12,
2009, after reviewing evidence from you and testimony by
several individuals who supported your petition. You appealed
the Board's denial of your petition to me on June 18, 2009.
After careful review, I have decided to deny your petition.
I note that you previously petitioned for a similar amendment
of WAC 2460-887-100 to remove medical marijuana from the
category of Schedule 1 controlled substances in 2007. In 2008
you requested that the Board adopt a rule rescheduling
industrial cannabis under the Uniform Controlled Substances
Act. After that petition was denied, you filed a petition for
judicial review in Thurston County Superior Court, although
you later agreed to dismiss that petition.
As I expressed to you previously, I support efforts to
implement Initiative 692, as intended by the voters in 1998
and ESSB 6032, as intended by the Legislature in 2007, to
allow for limited medical marijuana use by patients with
terminal or debilitating illnesses. I recognize that
organizations, including the Institute of Medicine, note both
the potential therapeutic value and potential risk factors of
medical marijuana. It remains important to address patient
needs while ensuring public safety.
I have denied your petition because substantial questions
remain about the safety of medical marijuana. As the Board
noted in its denial of your current petition, there are no
current standards for dose, strength, production or methods of
administering medical marijuana as a medicine. The Board also
found, and I agree, that sufficient questions exist about
whether medical marijuana meets the standards in RCW 69.50.201(a) for rescheduling or entirely removing from all
schedules, particularly RCW 69.50.201 (a)(i) through (vii),
given the dearth of scientific studies of a pharmacological
grade or product of medical marijuana, other than the
currently produced and available by prescription, synthetic
cannabinoid pharmacological product, Marinol. For these
reasons, I am denying your petition.
Sincerely,
Christine O. Gregoire
Governor
Reviser's note: The typographical error in the above section occurred in the copy filed by the agency and appears in the Register pursuant to the requirements of RCW 34.08.040.