Americans for Safe Accessannounced this month thatASA co-founder Steph Shererwill serve as President of theInternational Cannabis andCannabinoids Institute (ICCI) inPrague, Czech Republic. Shererwill provide vision andfundraising leadership asPresident of the ASA Board and will continueto work alongside Debbie Churgai, ASA’sInterim Director.
ICCI was co-founded by Sherer in 2015 as ajoint project of patient organizations, scientificsocieties, and American investment companyDioscorides Global Holdings. Since then, ICCI
has become a recognizedCenter of Excellence thatworks closely with interna-tional governments, universi-ties, and research institutes aswell as companies incannabis, hemp, bio-tech,and agricultural sectors tostrengthen the medical
cannabis industry.
“We are excited that Steph has decided tofocus more on ICCI in this next phase of hercareer,” said Dr. Pavel Kubu, the CEO of ICCI.“She has been a strong patient advocate andhas a clear vision of the trajectory of the med-ical cannabis industry. I am dedicated to sup-
port ASA programs scaling to extend patientaccess globally.”
In her 17 years as executive director of ASA,Sherer helped to pass medical cannabis legisla-tion throughout the U.S. and built ASA intothe largest nonprofit organization of patients,medical professionals, scientists, and con-cerned citizens promoting safe and legal accessto cannabis for therapeutic use and research.
“Now that societal and governmental barriersto patient access to medical cannabis arebreaking down, it is important the industryevolves to provide products that are safe, stan-dardized and targeted and that there is the sci-
Americans for Safe AccessA C T I V I S T N E W S L E T T E R
Defending Pat ients ’ Access to Medical Mari juanaMAY 2019 Volume 15, Issue 5
Americans for Safe Access • 1624 U Street NW, Suite 200 • Washington, D.C. 20009 202-857-4272 • [email protected] • www.AmericansForSafeAccess.org
ASA Co-founder Named President of Research Institute
A trio of bipartisan bills that wouldhelp ensure safe access for veteransreceived hearings last month. The
House Veterans’ Affairs Subcommittee onHealth heard testimony on the VA MedicinalCannabis Research Act of 2019 (H.R. 712), theVeterans Cannabis Use for Safe Healing Act(H.R. 2191), and the Veterans Equal Access Act(H.R. 1647). This hearing marks the first non-appropriations sub-committee hearing of the116th Congress on the issue of veterans’ med-ical cannabis access.
These bills are opposed by VA officials but sup-ported by many Veterans ServiceOrganizations, including the Iraq AfghanistanVeterans of America (IAVA), the Veterans ofForeign Wars, and Disabled AmericanVeterans. According to a poll conducted by theAmerican Legion, 92% of all veterans supportresearch into medical cannabis and 83% of vet-erans support legalizing medical cannabis.IAVA conducted a similar poll showing that83% of its members also support the legaliza-tion of medical cannabis.
The Veterans Equal Access Act would allowVeterans Health Administration (VHA) doctorsto help veteran patients fill out medicalcannabis enrollment paperwork in states witha medical cannabis program.
The VA Medicinal Cannabis Research Actwould direct the Secretary of the VA to carryout clinical trials on the effects of cannabis onhealth conditions prevalent in the veterancommunity, including chronic pain and post-traumatic stress disorder.
The Veterans Cannabis Use for Safe HealingAct would prohibit the VA from denying ben-efits to a veteran who is participating in a stateapproved medical cannabis program. The VHAsystem serves over nine million veterans, butVHA doctors are prohibited from recommend-ing cannabis. Veterans disproportionately suf-fer from conditions such as PTSD and chronicpain that are often treatable with cannabis.
The VA bills are part of a new Congressionalstrategy on medical cannabis. Instead of tack-ing on amendments to appropriations bills forthe Department of Justice (DOJ), medicalcannabis champions in Congress are pursuinglegislation that would not have to be renewedeach year. As a result, spending bills are emerg-ing from the House without medical cannabislanguage requested by bipartisan groups.
Veterans Move Closer to Safe Access with New Congressional Strategy(Continues page 2)
The month of May kicked off with about 100advocates gathering in Sacramento for thethird annual California state lobby day, spon-sored by NORML and Americans for SafeAccess. After a continental breakfast,California state Senator Scott Wiener andNicole Elliott, Senior Advisor on Cannabis toGovernor Gavin Newsom, each addressed thegroup about developing rules and legislation.
Following that, attendees went to the capitolfor pre-arranged meetings with lawmakersand their staffers about several pending bills.
ASA and NORML are urging support for SB 34to Protect Cannabis Compassion Programs inCalifornia; AB 286 to Temporarily Lower
Cannabis Taxes; SB 233 to Allow MedicalCannabis Access in Schools; AB 1465 to LicenseCannabis Consumption Cafés and Lounges;and SB 305 to Allow Qualified Patients MedicalCannabis Access in Healthcare Facilities.
Other bills to provide tax relief to veterans pur-chasing medical marijuana, provide feewaivers to equity business applicants, andabolish the state narcotics offenders’ registrywill also be presented.
After lobbying, participants completed feed-back forms about their visits and their repre-sentatives’ positions on bills, which theyturned in before attending a VIP reception forlawmakers that evening.
Calif. Lobby Day Brings Advocates to Capitol
Activist Profile: Janie and Rylie Maedler, DelawareJanie Maedler wasn’tplanning on raising amedical cannabisactivist. She just wantedthe best possible treat-ment for her youngdaughter’s rare medicalcondition. But half adozen years later, herdaughter Rylie, now 13,has been instrumentalin the passage of threemedical cannabis lawsin Delaware, one ofwhich is named for her.
Rylie’s parents first grew concerned when, as aseven-year-old, she began exhibiting unusualsymptoms: first, what looked like a persistentcold, then a blocked nostril, then losing herteeth. After months of uncertainty, a CAT scanfound an aggressive tumor attacking one sideForty-seven tests later, doctors concluded itwas a very rare form of tumor, aggressivegiant cell granuloma. Surgery and chemother-apy were still the treatment, so the Maedlerfamily began a complementary treatmentwith cannabis. Janie had done some researchon what her young daughter was facing andhad decided cannabis could be effective infighting Rylie’s recurrent tumors.
A year later, in 2014, Rylie was speaking atRotary Clubs and other groups, raisingfunds and support to start a nonprofit, Rylie’sSmile Foundation, for children suffering fromrare diseases. Then she and her mother turnedtheir attention to the Delaware legislature,campaigning for a medical cannabis law thatwould allow access for other children such as
Rylie, who had nowalso developed aseizure disorder thatcannabis extractshelped control, alongwith her tumors. Aftermonths of testifying athearings and speakingto the media, Delawarepassed “Rylie’s Law” in2015, establishing legalaccess to medicalcannabis on the recom-mendation of a pedia-trician.
Rylie and her family soon discovered that thereis more to safe access than passing a law. InDelaware, cannabis could not be brought onschool grounds, so Rylie had to leave schooleach day to administer her medicine, crossinga bridge to meet her mother. Then, there wasthe bomb threat.
“I didn’t know why she wasn’t at our regularspot and the regular time,” Janie says. “I hadno way to know, and she had no way to tellme, that the school had moved all the studentsto a secure location.”
Rylie didn’t get her medicine that day, and hada seizure. Delaware lawmakers were soonopening handwritten letters from Rylieexplaining that she needed one more thingfrom them. She could make it across thatbridge in a Nor’easter, but what about otherkids with oxygen tanks or mobility problems?
By the time Rylie was done lobbying, the stateboard of education and the state nurses asso-
ciation both supported the change unani-mously, and in 2016 the legislature passed thebill. Rylie asked the then-governor, JackMarkell, to sign the bill at her school so theother kids could see why she’d missed so muchschool going to the capital. He obliged.
“Sometimes people will call me a “posterchild,” Rylie says. “This bothers me so muchbecause I work my butt off. My mom is an out-spoken advocate, and I begged her to let medo this. When I was 11years old, we madesome agreements that I had to take care of myhealth and grades first, but she and my dadwould let me.”
In early 2017, Janie and Rylie began trying tofigure out how to add other conditions. Thebill to go from a legislative process to a peti-tion process for adding conditions stalled afterpassing out of committee. At the end of June,with two weeks left in the session, Janie start-ed rallying legislators. At midnight on the lastnight of the session, “Jonathan’s Law” passed.
Rylie’s Smile Foundation filed a petition to addautism under the new law. At first officialsbalked at a blanket autism diagnosis, but Janiehelped organize mothers of child,ren withautism to come to the hearing and inDecember 2017, Delaware added “severedebilitating autism.”
Last year, Rylie went back to Legislative Hallwith a list of things to work on, even as heradvocacy goes global. She appeared inAustralia and Israel last year, will be in HongKong for a technology conference on marketdisruptors in October, and gave the keynoteaddress at the Cannabis Science Conference.
“I have so much that I want to do and say. Ifelt like I could not be heard if I did not dothis,” Rylie says. “There is a stigma in our owncommunity that the pediatric patients are notheard, yet we are the ones who change somany laws.”
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ACTION ALERT: Give the FDA Your Perspective on CBD The U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) will hold a public hearing on May 31on how to regulate CBD in products for human consumption such as foods, bever-ages, and dietary supplements. The FDA has also opened a public comment periodon the issue. This is your chance to make an impact on important federal policy. ReadASA's suggestions for submitting regulatory comments and submit your own on theregulation of CBD at www.safeaccessnow.org/fdacomment
entific infrastructure to support theseefforts,” said Sherer. “I am excited to expandthe community of scientists, investors, andindustry leaders committed to serving patientsand expanding access to medical cannabis.”
Sherer built collaborative relationships withthe American Herbal Products Association(AHPA) and the American HerbalPharmacopoeia (AHP) to create the first med-ical cannabis industry standards in the areas ofdistribution, cultivation, analytics, manufac-turing, packaging, and labeling. Sherer’s inter-national work has focused on medicalcannabis policies at the United Nations andwithin countries as a founding member of theInternational Medical Cannabis PatientsCoalition (IMCPC).
(SHERER, continued from page 1)
