Midway through a five-hour hearing on legalizing marijuana Monday, Sen. Nicholas Scutari (D-Union) made a surprising admission.
The medical marijuana law program Scutari helped usher in seven years ago is frustratingly hard to navigate — even for him.
Or more specifically, his mother.
First, some context: Scutari went 10 rounds with Sen. Gerald Cardinale (R-Bergen) trying to persuade the veteran lawmaker and dentist that outlawing marijuana has helped no one but drug dealers and opioid manufacturers.
Cardinale, who grilled supporters of the bill over the course of several hours, pointed to a Harvard study that shows marijuana use can cause long-lasting brain damage in adults.
The war on marijuana is a failure, Scutari retorted, “despite the best efforts of every president before, it’s still going on. We’ve ruined countless lives. And no one has died from it (a marijuana overdose).”
“Opioids you can get all day long. Doctors can prescribe opioids like it’s going out of style” Scutari said.
That’s when it got personal.
“I didn’t want to say this but my mother can get 120 opioids at the drop of a hat because she has multiple sclerosis, but to try to get marijuana it’s such rigamarole, she won’t do it. It’s so much easier to get this narcotic, but she can’t get the marijuana that would probably benefit her under the bill I passed seven years ago. With all the hurdles we have put up, my mother can’t get it.”
Scutari later said his mother is discouraged from joining because her doctors are not registered with the program. She’d have to find a doctor willing to take her on at her own expense, and develop a relationship before she could be recommended to the program. These complaints are nothing new to patients, which number more than 11,000 New Jerseyans.
“You are an excellent advocate. I’ve known that for 10 years. But that doesn’t change a very important fact, that the mere passage of this bill will encourage the public to believe marijuana use is not harmful,” Cardinale said.
The hearing continued on for another 90 minutes.
credit:nj.com
