The Georgia House on Monday gave overwhelming approval to a bill that would legalize a type of medical marijuana to treat certain seizure disorders.
Rep. Allen Peake, R-Macon, the sponsor of House Bill 885, said it's an important step toward saving the lives of children who can suffer 100 or more seizures a day. The particular strain of marijuana, known as Charlotte's Web, has shown it can ease or eliminate symptoms of patients taking the cannabis oil derived from the plant.
In Colorado, where marijuana is legal, there is a waiting list of 2,000 patients who want access to the oil, which does not cause the taker to get high.
While there are obstacles and some warn him he is moving too fast, Peake answered: “We cannot move fast enough.”
The bill gained bipartisan support. Rep. Nikki Randall, D-Macon, said the bill is "a chance worth taking."
“If we can offer the slightest rise, the slightest improvement in the quality of life for these children, these families, I think we’re doing the right thing,” she said.
The bill passed 171-4 and now goes to the Senate.
The bill would allow cannabis oil produced at the University of Mississippi under an approved federal program and allow the state’s research institutions to cultivate marijuana to produce the oil. Patients would have to go through a lengthy process to actually receive the oil, including screening by a state panel.
“It will provide the opportunity for families to make a personal choice in concert with their medical professional on what is in the best interest of their children,” Peake said.
House Majority Leader Larry O'Neal, R-Bonaire, wanted assurances that marijuana imported would not end up in the hands of "criminal element or using it for nefarious reasons or 'hippie' reasons.'"
Peake said access to the product would be extremely limited but acknowledged more could be done in the bill to make sure.
Rep. Ben Watson, R-Savannah, a physician, is a co-sponsor who said he was won over by Peake and his own research. There are protections, he said.
“The safeguards put in this from academic research centers, the tightening up of the regulations to the law that exists already are pertinent and very important,” Watson said. “Can we tighten them up some more? Certainly that may need to be the case.”
Those suffering from these seizure disorders, and other conditions, have been failed by the federal government, Rep. B.J. Pak, R-Lilburn, said, by failing to advance research on medical marijuana.
“The bureaucratic nightmare has caused and stifled scientific innovation,” Pak, a former federal prosecutor, said.
That might be true, but there is important research that needs to be done, said Rep. Sharon Cooper, R-Marietta, the chairwoman of the House Health and Human Services Committee.
“We can go through this whole process and then we could not get any research done” because of federal regulations, Cooper said. “If that’s what’s broken, let’s work on correcting that.”
Still, Cooper voted for the bill.
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