Oregon NORML Honors Growers

For a long time C Notes naively assumed that a "cannabis cup" competition was simply an excuse to indulge. We wondered how anybody, after sampling one strain, could judge the effect of any strain sampled subsequently? Oregon NORML resolves this fool's paradox by doing the judging over the course of several weeks (patients get one gram per day to evaluate) and announcing the results at an awards dinner preceded by a day of medical and legal panels. This year 25 growers entered the competition by donating strains and 28 patients served as judges. Strains were evaluated on a scale of 1 to 10 for "appearance," "aroma," "taste," "smoothness (is it easy on your lungs?)", "potency (how strong is the strain?)," and "medicinal effect (how well does it work for your individual condition?)." Medicinal effect was given double weight in the scoring. The awards dinner was held on the Saturday after Thanksgiving at the Ambridge Center in downtown Portland. First-prize winner David V. said, "This is a dream come true," as he accepted a blue ribbon from organizer Madeline Martinez, and you could tell he meant it. The winners will make cuttings available to patients through Oregon NORML later this month. ("Dynamite," the overall winner, also took first prize in smoothness, taste, and aroma.) Many growers wish they had access to an analytical lab so they could determine the true content of their plants and breed strains in which different cannabinoids predominate. Rick Bayer, MD, a Portland internist who chaired the legal and medical panels, was asked by a patient in a wheelchair about the best strain for spasticity. "That's a good question," Bayer reflected in an interview afterwards, "and you don't want to recommend a strain that's uninformative or misleading or named after somebody's cat." According to Bayer, the strains that score highest for medicinal effect were relaxants rather than stimulants, Indicas rather than Sativas.

More than 70 people attended the panels -including 11 lawyers who will pick Up 5.0 hours' worth of continuing-legal-education credits from the state bar. A highlight of the medical session was a report by nurse Ed Glick concluding that Oregon patients who use cannabis to treat various physical conditions also experience reduced anxiety, depression, and insomnia. Oregon's Medical Marijuana Program, which is administered by the Department of Health Services (DHS), does not recognize that psychiatric problems can be alleviated by cannabis. Glick's data will be presented to DHS, which is authorized by law to expand the list of conditions treatable by cannabis. DHS turned down a request to add anxiety in 2000. Oregon law will change on January 1, 2006, when Senate Bill 1085 takes effect. (Its author, State Sen. Bill Morrisette, was thanked profusely at NORML's awards dinner.) Patients and caregivers will be allowed to possess a pound and a half of dried herb and to grow six flowering plants and 18 vegetative plants under one foot tall. SB 1085 recognizes the reality of the grower -"the person responsible for the growsite"- who needn't be a patient or caregiver. It limits to four the number of patients the growsite can serve. Thus the maximum number of plants in a garden will be 24 flowering and 72 starts -just below the number that triggers a mandatory-minimum sentence under federal law.

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