In this week's Chemical and Engineering News, this update (article by Britt Erickson):
A bill that would make it easier for scientists in the US to study the potential benefits and harms of medical cannabis cleared the Senate on Nov. 16. The House of Representatives had passed the legislation (H.R. 8454) in July, and President Joe Biden is expected to sign the bill into law.
The bill directs the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) to identify policies that inhibit cannabis research and to recommend how to overcome those barriers. It also paves the way for research institutions to grow their own cannabis or import cannabis for medical research purposes, but it does not allow scientists to purchase cannabis from state-run dispensaries.
Cannabis is classified as a Schedule I drug, meaning that it has no accepted medical benefits and has a high likelihood of addiction. Because of that classification, researchers need approval from several government agencies to conduct clinical studies using cannabis.
H.R. 8454 aims to streamline and speed up that approval process. It gives the US attorney general a 60-day deadline to approve cannabis research applications or request additional information from the applicant.
I used to say "it is guaranteed there will be more cannabis chemists in (next year) than there are (this year)" simply because we were growing from a time where there were zero regularly-employed full time chemists working in this field, and then people were moving into the field regularly. It will be interesting to see when this will plateau, but it doesn't seem to be stopping yet. The seemingly-inexorable move towards descheduling/full legalization seems like that would only accelerate the move of more people into the industry...
While Schedule I agents, i.e. THC & marijuana, continues to scare the Megadose Vit C out the Linus Pauling's at DEA HQ, 'wholesome pharmaceuticals' like morphine & fentanyl reside in the research friendly cul-de-sac of Schedule II. The ongoing turf war between Eli-Lilly and El Chapo has been a boon for Biggie Pharma's "Big Addiction" subsidiaries. While major narcotraffickers JNJ-Noramco, Purdue & Mallinckrodt reorganize/divest some of their narco-holdings in the wake of the Opioid Master Settlement Agreement, opportunities abound for novel addiction maintenance-therapeutics. Trevena's pipeline includes TRV734, an orally-active mu-opioid agonist derived from their earlier parenteral painkiller, oliceridine. They hope to cash in on the lucrative methadone/MAT market. The pair of geriatric competitors, both offering subpar ligands w/ either dangerous side effects (methadone) or low efficacy (buprenorphine)--the 80-year old opioid-on-life-support (methadone) and the 60-yo boomer-opioid (buprenorphine) trying to scrape together a CEO-caliber retirement on generic pharma pension and a pittance of social security. These ligands served their purpose: helped defeat European fascism, teach Japan a lesson, and took Uncle Joe to task over his choice in Eastern european drapery, but their tactics are now as outmoded as island hopping on a jetski. They've served their purpose, now they can retire from public life--just like Rosemary Kennedy.
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