Senate Infrastructure Bill would allow study of dispensary cannabis

Marijuana Moment shares that the Senate infrastructure bill has been released & includes provisions that allow researchers to study the actual marijuana from state-legal dispensaries instead of having to use only government-grown cannabis:

The bill also encourages states that have enacted legalization laws to educate people about impaired driving.

…The measure makes it so the transportation secretary would need to work with the attorney general and secretary of health and human services to develop a public report within two years of the bill’s enactment that includes recommendations on allowing scientists to access retail-level marijuana to study impaired driving.

The cannabis provision stipulates that the report must contain a recommendation on establishing a national clearinghouse to “collect and distribute samples and strains of marijuana for scientific research that includes marijuana and products containing marijuana lawfully available to patients or consumers in a state on a retail basis.”

It specifies that scientists from states that have not yet enacted legalization should also be able to access to dispensary products that are being sold in jurisdictions that have ended prohibition.

…While advocates are supportive of measures to reduce impaired driving, some have raised issues with the implication that legalizing cannabis increases the risk of people driving while under the influence. Research isn’t settled on that subject.

A federally funded study recently promoted by the National Institute of Justice also found that the amount of THC in a person’s system after consuming marijuana is not an accurate predictor of impairment.

More in Marijuana Moment & kudos to the Senate for working to allow research on the actual strains & products that are healing people with cannabis every day!