Tag: bill

  • Senate votes to send cannabis research bill to Biden (Newsletter: November 17, 2022)

    Senate votes to send cannabis research bill to Biden (Newsletter: November 17, 2022)

    Interstate marijuana commerce suit; Biden: cannabis moves are “top” achievements; Reps want banking data; GOP Congress legalization plan; MD hearing

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    / TOP THINGS TO KNOW

    The Senate approved a House-passed marijuana research bill—marking the first time in history that standalone cannabis reform legislation has ever been sent to the president’s desk.

    • Just before the vote, Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer said on the floor that he’s holding “productive talks” about “moving additional bipartisan cannabis legislation in the lame duck.”

    The White House is touting President Joe Biden’s move to pardon people for cannabis and initiate a review of its scheduling status as one of the administration’s “top accomplishments”—saying it will remedy the U.S.’s “failed approach to marijuana.”

    Reps. Barbara Lee (D-CA) and Earl Blumenauer (D-OR) sent a letter asking the Treasury Department’s Financial Crimes Enforcement Network to provide marijuana banking data—including a demographic breakdown that they say can “inform federal efforts around equitably ending the racist cannabis prohibition.”

    Rep. Nancy Mace (R-SC) spoke to Marijuana Moment about her plans to advance marijuana reform in a Republican-controlled House of Representatives next year.

    • “The only place that cannabis is controversial is in D.C.”

    An Oregon marijuana business filed a federal lawsuit seeking to overturn the state’s ban on cannabis exports and imports to and from other states—arguing that it violated the U.S. Constitution’s Dormant Commerce Clause.

    The Maryland House Cannabis Referendum and Legalization Workgroup held its first hearing since voters overwhelmingly approved legalization on the ballot. Lawmakers now need to craft legislation regulating the market, and this latest meeting focused on taxes.

    Three subcommittees of the Louisiana Employment and Medical Marijuana Task Force met to discuss issues related to workplace protections for medical cannabis patients.

    / FEDERAL

    Former President Donald Trump, in his reelection campaign announcement speech, said he would “wage war on the cartels” and reiterated that he would ask Congress for legislation “ensuring that drug dealers…who are responsible for death, carnage and crime” would receive the death penalty.

    Sen. Steve Daines (R-MT) said he is open to including expungements provisions in a package of marijuana reforms alongside banking access.

    Former House Speaker Newt Gingrich (R-GA) said he will be watching to see how Sen.-elect John Fetterman (D-PA) evolves and changes “in between periods of marijuana and whatever else it is he does.”

    Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-NY) tweeted, “President Biden sent an important signal when he pardoned citizens with federal charges for simple marijuana possession. But there’s still a lot more to do: 1 Expungement. A pardon ends a prison sentence, but it doesn’t erase the charge from your record. People with simple marijuana possessions are still being blocked from accessing housing, employment and other resources. We must expunge records in addition to providing pardons. 2 Pardon immigrants. President Biden’s pardon only applied to citizens with federal marijuana charges. Many immigrants applying for citizenship could continue to face deportation or other adverse consequences for possessing a substance that is now legal in many states.”

    Rep. Ayanna Pressley (D-MA) tweeted, “Black folks have been disproportionately locked up for marijuana offenses. Now, we’re being locked out of the growing legal cannabis industry. We need a cannabis policy that centers equity and the people most impacted by the failed War on Drugs.”

    Former Rep. Greg Walden (R-OR)  tweeted about the participation of the Coalition for Cannabis Policy, Education, and Regulation, for which he serves as co-chair, in a congressional hearing, saying, “Today’s hearing was a step in the right direction to creating a legal, regulated market for cannabis through federal guidelines.”

    / STATES

    South Dakota Gov. Kristi Noem (R) said her reelection effort was “tough” because marijuana and other issues were on the ballot.

    The Pennsylvania House of Representatives voted to impeach Philadelphia’s district attorney through a resolution that criticizes his decision not to prosecute certain marijuana and drug paraphernalia cases.

    Kansas’s House minority leader wants an interim committee on medical cannabis to have additional meetings.

    A Missouri senator-elect who currently serves as a representative said he would file a proposed constitutional amendment to steer legal marijuana tax revenue toward eliminating the personal property tax.

    Florida has a new top medical cannabis regulator.

    Indiana’s State Police superintendent said he doesn’t support legalizing marijuana but that he hasn’t seen an increase in enforcement near the borders with states that have enacted reform.

    Ohio regulators said it doesn’t appear that the state can enter into a medical cannabis reciprocity agreement with Kentucky under the limited provisions of an executive order on the issue that Gov. Andy Beshear (D) issued this week.

    New York regulators are being accused of violating the Constitution with guidance that says recreational marijuana “dispensaries, their true parties of interest, passive investors, and any management service providers cannot have any interest in any business anywhere that cultivates, processes, or distributes cannabis.”

    Oklahoma regulators are accepting public comments on proposed medical cannabis rules through December 15.

    Vermont regulators posted an update on the first six weeks of the state’s legal adult-use marijuana market.

    Arizona regulators will begin accepting applications for nonprofit medical cannabis dispensary certificates on December 16.

    Washington State regulators will host a conversation to explore ideas for modernizing rules for cannabis plant canopy on November 29.


    Marijuana Moment is tracking more than 1,500 cannabis, psychedelics and drug policy bills in state legislatures and Congress this year. Patreon supporters pledging at least $25/month get access to our interactive maps, charts and hearing calendar so they don’t miss any developments.

    Learn more about our marijuana bill tracker and become a supporter on Patreon to get access.

    / LOCAL

    The San Francisco, California Board of Supervisors voted to suspend the city’s cannabis business tax until the end of 2025.

    / INTERNATIONAL

    The Colombian Senate First Committee approved a report attached to a marijuana legalization bill, with a vote on the legislation itself expected next week.

    Bavaria, Germany’s health minister is urging European Union officials to block his country’s marijuana legalization plans.

    / SCIENCE & HEALTH

    A review concluded that “CBD is a well-tolerated and safe natural compound that exerts analgesic effects, decreasing hyperalgesia, and mechanical/thermal allodynia in several animal models of pain and patients” and that “using CBD seems to be a promising strategy to overcome the lack of efficacy of conventional treatment for chronic pain.”

    A review highlighted the “diversification of clinical trials on cannabinoid-based medications in the past 21 years,” underlining “the increased interest in conducting clinical studies on new cannabinoid administration methods such as topical applications and on the investigation of emerging phyto- and synthetic cannabinoids” and showing that “more clinical trials have been designed to explore the potential therapeutic benefits of cannabinoids in areas such as mental, behavioral, or neurodevelopmental disorders and skin diseases.”

    / ADVOCACY, OPINION & ANALYSIS

    A poll of Scottish adults found that they support ending prosecutions of people for possessing small amounts of marijuana, 65 percent to 18 percent, and support enacting the same policy for heroin, 42 percent to 36 percent.

    The Kentucky Democratic Party tweeted, “Thanks to Gov. @AndyBeshearKY’s executive order, medical cannabis can be legally used starting Jan. 1, providing a lifeline to Kentuckians in pain. This is huge — while GOP lawmakers continue to ignore the will of an overwhelming majority of Kentuckians, Gov. Beshear listened.” The party also criticized the state’s agriculture commissioner, saying, “After Ryan Quarles tried to ban Delta 8, a state court ruled that this hemp derivative — which is not a controlled substance under state or federal law — is legal in Kentucky. Yesterday @GovAndyBeshear announced official regulations to ensure it can be sold and purchased safely.”

    ASTM International’s cannabis committee developed a new practice for supplier lifecycle management.

    Oklahoma Southern Baptists adopted a resolution opposing marijuana legalization.

    The director of Americans for Prosperity Montana spoke about efforts to build support for psychedelics policy reform in the state.

    / BUSINESS

    SHF Holdings, Inc., d/b/a/ Safe Harbor Financial closed its acquisition of Rockview Digital Solutions, Inc, d/b/a Abaca.

    Charlotte’s Web Holdings, Inc. received a $56.8 million investment from a subsidiary of BAT.

    Payments provider Zotto is being accused of withholding money from several CBD companies.

    WM Technology, Inc. has a new chief marketing officer.

    Michigan retailers sold $209.4 million worth of legal marijuana products in October.

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  • Senate passes marijuana medication bill

    Senate passes marijuana medication bill

    The Senate passed a bill on Wednesday night time that will grow exploration into the likely health care added benefits of cannabis and CBD.

    The Medical Cannabis and Cannabidiol Research Growth Act was handed on Wednesday by means of unanimous consent by a voice vote and will now head to President Biden’s desk to be signed.

    The invoice, passed by the Property in July, establishes a new registration method for exploring cannabis and its derivatives. Under the provisions of this legislation, the Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) will be directed to register entities who carry out cannabis study and those people who offer the marijuana.

    The registered entities will be permitted to manufacture, distribute, dispense and possess cannabis or CBD for clinical analysis applications.

    “There is substantial proof that marijuana-derived prescription drugs can and are giving major well being gains. Our monthly bill will make it much easier to review how these medications can take care of a variety of conditions, ensuing in much more patients becoming capable to easily obtain harmless medicines,” mentioned Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.), who introduced the monthly bill alongside with Sens. Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa) and Brian Schatz (D-Hawaii).

    Until eventually this 12 months, the Nationwide Centre for the Advancement of Purely natural Products at the University of Mississippi was the only accepted provider of marijuana for study reasons in the United States. The marijuana at the Mississippi facility was solely grown for research conducted by the National Institute on Drug Abuse.

    Having said that, the DEA mentioned in 2021 that it would prioritize efforts to develop cannabis analysis. The agency authorised six new entities this yr to mature cannabis for analysis, which include the Scottsdale Study Institute in Arizona and Royal Emerald Pharmaceuticals in California.

    “At a time when much more than 155 million Individuals reside wherever adult-use of hashish is legal at the point out or neighborhood stage and there are four million registered health-related marijuana consumers with several extra likely to self-medicate, it is necessary that we are in a position to fully research the impacts of cannabis use,” stated Rep. Earl Blumenauer (D-Ore.), co-chairman and founder of the Congressional Cannabis Caucus, in a assertion.

    At the second, 37 U.S. states and Washington, D.C., permit for the healthcare use of cannabis. And following voters handed ballot steps in several states in the modern midterm elections, virtually 50 percent of all states also now permit grownup recreational use of the drug.

    In Oct, Biden also requested the secretary of Health and Human Companies and the legal professional basic to overview marijuana’s position as a Routine I drug. This status areas cannabis in the identical class as heroin and LSD, designating it as a substance with no health-related price and a higher potential for abuse.

  • Dr. Bill Rawls Announces Launch of Cellular Wellness Conversation Series

    Dr. Bill Rawls Announces Launch of Cellular Wellness Conversation Series

    Webinar collection will emphasize matters in wellbeing and wellness foremost up to the launch of new e-book The Cellular Wellness Answer

    RALEIGH, N.C., June 8, 2022 /PRNewswire/ — Dr. Bill Rawls, the Health care Director for on the net holistic well being corporation Vital Strategy, declared today the start of a discussion series that will count down to the June 21st release of his new ebook: The Cellular Wellness Alternative: Faucet Into Your Full Health and fitness Prospective with the Science-Backed Electricity of Herbs.                           

    “The sheer sum of conflicting wellness details that individuals are currently being bombarded with is overpowering, but the essential issue is truly extremely very simple: wellness commences at the mobile degree,” explained Dr. Rawls. “I wrote The Mobile Wellness Alternative to emphasize the crucial part our cells perform in supporting best overall health, and our want to emphasize keeping our mobile wellness as extended as we can to hold dwelling balanced life as we age.”

    The initially matter in the Mobile Wellness Solution Discussion Sequence: “A Sneak Peak at The Mobile Wellness Remedy will be available at 8PM ET/ 5PM PT on Wednesday, June 15, 2022. This very first celebration will function Dr. Rawls in conversation with Tim Yarborough of Important Program and signal up is free to all attendees. This webinar will:

    • Demystify the science and describes in simple English how our cells purpose, age, and deteriorate
    • Describe how keeping cellular wellness will allow you to sluggish down the growing older system – and improve your vitality so you really feel greater, and even appear younger
    • Display how to get off the hamster wheel of health and fitness fads and harness the purely natural cleaning and restorative powers of your possess cells
    • Aid viewers comprehend the therapeutic and restorative qualities located in herbs – attributes confirmed by the most up to date science and discoveries
    • Present easy to follow natural remedies and actions we can get to protect our personal cells – and our overall health. 

    “Our overall healthcare technique has gravitated towards prescribing drugs to handle and block fundamental indications, when not supplying men and women options to get management of their possess health and fitness,” stated Rawls. “Though prescription medicines are not prolonged-phrase options, the one of a kind homes of herbs boost healing at the mobile degree, supplying them a unique energy to reduce the incidence of all chronic illnesses, gradual getting old, and increase effectiveness.”

    Each and every webinar attendee will also get a likelihood to win a pre-launch duplicate of The Cellular Wellness Resolution.  You can register for the webinar right here. The Cellular Wellness Alternative will be produced on June 21, 2022 – indicator up at www.CellularWellness.com for an progress search at the ebook as nicely as specific giveaways and components as we count down to the start.

    ABOUT DR. Monthly bill RAWLS: A licensed health practitioner for about 30 many years, Monthly bill Rawls, MD has dedicated his daily life to medicine. When a health crisis in his early forties abruptly improved his high quality of life, he came experience to confront with the restrictions of modern day medication and began to discover the large options of substitute remedies. Restoring his wellness as a result of holistic and natural therapies influenced him to share his discoveries on the great importance of mobile wellness. Now, he will work to deliver health and vitality to other folks as he can help them establish their possess paths to wellness through contemporary herbology.  He is the author of the most effective-promoting Unlocking Lyme and the Professional medical Director of RawlsMD and Critical System, an on the net holistic wellbeing company and Certified B Company primarily based in Raleigh, NC. For additional on The Mobile Wellness Alternative, go to www.CellularWellness.com

    Source Important Prepare

  • California Poised to Adopt ‘Medical Misinformation Bill’ Targeting Alternative COVID-19 Protocols

    California Poised to Adopt ‘Medical Misinformation Bill’ Targeting Alternative COVID-19 Protocols

    The California Legislature is poised to move Assembly Bill 2098, explained as a “medical misinformation monthly bill.” If handed, the new regulation would prohibit medical doctors from freely supplying medical suggestions and managing their patients if individuals practices operate counter to the formal state sanctioned posture.

    In April 2020, the State of California Office of Client Affairs, the California Point out Board of Pharmacy, and the Health-related Board of California issued a assertion (pdf) with regards to the “improper prescribing of medications connected to therapy of Novel Coronavirus,” these as hydroxychloroquine, warning that “inappropriately prescribing or dispensing prescription drugs constitutes unprofessional carry out in California.”

    On June 29, 2021, the Federation of Point out Health-related Boards issued a warning, stating that “Physicians who make and spread COVID-19 vaccine misinformation or disinformation are risking disciplinary action by condition medical boards, such as the suspension or revocation of their health-related license.”

    In August 2021, Dr. Anthony Fauci reported there was no evidence that ivermectin operates, and that it’s extra probably to cause damage. In December 2021, the Food and Drug Administration issued a warning headlined, “Why You Should really Not Use Ivermectin to Take care of or Protect against COVID-19.” In an updated April 29, 2022, report, the COVID-19 Procedure Rules Panel said it “recommends against the use of ivermectin for the procedure of COVID-19, besides in scientific trials.”

    Should AB 2098 come to be law, health professionals who prescribe remedies not accepted by the point out or who assert unsanctioned drugs are successful would see their licenses revoked and face rigorous penalties and disciplinary steps by the Medical Board of California.

    In quick, AB 2098 would designate the dissemination of data not approved by the point out connected to the SARS-CoV-2 coronavirus, which causes “COVID-19,” as misinformation or disinformation, which constitutes unprofessional perform.

    One doctor, Dr. Syed Haider, has presently been documented to 4 condition professional medical boards by pharmacists he suggests “don’t like filling ivermectin prescriptions.” He has also been pressured to keep a law firm to safeguard his health care license.

    (Courtesy of Dr. Haider)
    Dr. Syed Haider (Courtesy of Haider)

    Considering that December 2020—after acknowledging that the United States experienced offshored nearly all prescription drug manufacturing to unfriendly nations like China—Haider has concentrated on the avoidance and treatment method of the CCP (Chinese Communist Party) virus by his on the web initiative mygotodoc.com, by furnishing effortless on the web entry to off-label prescriptions this kind of as ivermectin, hydroxychloroquine, budesonide, and protocols for COVID, very long COVID, and vaccine injuries.

    “There was these a big demand for it, it just took above my lifetime,” Haider, who used to be “a clinic health care provider,” told The Epoch Instances. “Then, the pandemic hit.”

    In early February 2020, Haider contracted the CCP virus at a healthcare facility that he was working in. His function as a non permanent touring doctor throughout quite a few various professional medical techniques and hospitals was coming to an end and he considered that, with the pandemic outbreak, there would be lots of operate. Even so, although he had used for a place at a medical center in New York, Haider had begun to listen to about on-line prescribing, and he started to perform by way of an unnamed on the web telemedicine service provider in the United States.

    “Once I heard about ivermectin and off-label prescribing, men and women would show up on the on-line web page seeking for assistance with COVID and I would try out to notify them about off-label prescription drugs,” Haider recalled. “And they would just give me a blank stare. Apart from hydroxychloroquine, they had hardly ever listened to about medications like ivermectin. They assumed I was crazy. I think the considered was, ‘If this things operates, why haven’t I heard about it on CNN, Fox News, or MSNBC?”

    In accordance to Haider, what genuinely improved things for him was when he saw the Dec. 8, 2020, testimony of Dr. Pierre Kory (pdf) right before Sen. Ron Johnson and the Homeland Protection Committee Assembly regarding early remedy of COVID-19, “not only as an personal medical professional,” but also on behalf of his non-profit firm, the Front-Line COVID-19 Essential Care Alliance.

    “Although we, like numerous, are really inspired by the clear successes in building effective vaccines,” Kory reported, “we also are dismayed at the near complete absence of direction and study on effective early, at-home, or preventative remedy alternatives aside from vaccines—a fact we obtain unconscionable.”

    It was “with wonderful delight as properly as substantial optimism” that Kory noted that his team, “led by Professor Paul E. Marik,” had “developed a highly successful protocol for preventing and early remedy of COVID-19,” and that “emerging publications” had furnished “conclusive knowledge on the profound efficacy of the anti-parasite, anti-viral drug, anti-inflammatory agent named ivermectin in all stages of the sickness.”

    “It was authentic clear in his encounter and in his demeanor that he was definitely upset and incredibly honest and it went viral on the internet,” Haider recalled. “Then, people started hearing from relatives and friends that they had utilized ivermectin and it created a big difference for them, and individuals went on the internet to locate medical practitioners who would prescribe it. At that level, factors obtained incredibly busy and I experienced to in essence start my own website and prescribing it online to clients. Above the future calendar year and a fifty percent, matters truly ramped up. Extra and extra people experienced begun listening to about ivermectin, so more and more people today have been seeking for it.”

    According to the web page, “mygotodoc makes it simple to safeguard you and your household, serving three critical requirements the broader medical local community tends to overlook: (1) emergency antibiotics to have on hand in scenario catastrophe strikes and prescription medicine are unavailable, (2) 1-thirty day period backup supplies of your frequent treatment, and (3) risk-free off-label COVID protocols made for prevention and therapy.”

    “Myself and other doctors from all about the entire world have experienced remarkable final results with off-label protocols such as ivermectin, hydroxychloroquine, budesonide, and a range of other protocols,” Haider stated. “What you hear about and over yet again is about the successful procedure of 5,000, 7,000, or 10,000 individuals and possibly one demise. They are stunning quantities when compared to what you are hearing with common remedies the CDC or Food and drug administration are recommending and what hospitals and other physicians are performing that are not employing off-label protocols.”

    Personally, Haider has dealt with above 50,000 COVID-connected individuals, lots of of them elderly. He claimed that amid his individuals, there have been zero fatalities and only 5 hospitalizations. In spite of his achievements, below California’s proposed Bill AB 2098, doctor’s employing equivalent procedures would have the state interfere and persecute them for supplying unbiased treatment.

    “Like a lot of other medical doctors about the environment, I’ve just been striving to raise consciousness of this,” Haider discussed. “But, like a great deal of physicians in The us, I’ve gotten letters from the American Medical Association, the Federal State Professional medical Board warning me that my license is at threat if I converse out about vaccines or if I spread misinformation or if I prescribe ivermectin. I’ve experienced pushback from pharmacists, insurance coverage corporations, from clinical boards in numerous states, that have sent me issues and asked me to reveal why I am conducting experimental trials on patients and why I am prescribing ivermectin.”

    Prior to all of this, Haider had labored for in excess of 10 yrs as a experienced healthcare facility doctor in internal medicine and experienced “never had a one grievance from anyone on nearly anything.”

    “So, it was a extremely unusual knowledge above the earlier couple of decades to see what has took place to health-related companies, together with pharmacists,” Haider spelled out. “Pharmacists were being pushing again at us mainly because they have been acquiring letters from their pharmacist boards warning them not to dispense it. ”

    In accordance to Haider, dissenting voices have been muzzled and censored from the incredibly onset of the pandemic and they are now being threatened with the decline of their health care licenses. Due to the fact of this, Haider has had to keep an attorney.

    “It’s incredibly tense to have to reply to a professional medical board,” he defined, introducing that it is a “very opaque method.”

    “You really don’t know who is heading to see it or assessment it. You really do not know no matter if or not they’re friendly to what you are doing or if they disagree with what you are carrying out, and it is not like a court of regulation the place you can provide in witnesses in your protection. They just make a choice and occasionally they do not even make clear to you the reason powering it.”

    Even worse than that, Haider explained his experience felt like they had been attempting to get doctors like himself to “get tripped up and to say the wrong things” and to incriminate themselves.

    “One of the clinical boards accused me of conducting healthcare experimental trials,” he reported. “It’s not like they really do not know I’m prescribing off-label. We do off-label prescribing all the time in medication. About 40 p.c of prescribing is off-label and it doesn’t tumble beneath the classification of ‘experiment.’ It’s not an unauthorized experimental health care demo. But they use that wording to try to get me to protect myself against that attack. If I experienced foolishly replied to them and experimented with to defend myself in opposition to their terminology, I would have incriminated myself mainly because I cannot operate an experiment without the need of acquiring a critique board, authorization, and unique consent sorts for experimental drug trials.”

    Haider reflected on how through the present-day change to vilify ivermectin that “everyone would seem to overlook that, in the course of the previous six months, they experienced the same issues with prescribing hydroxychloroquine.”

    “I can send a hydroxychloroquine prescription to any pharmacist and they’ll fill it with no dilemma,” he stated. “But now, they will not fill ivermectin. It almost looks political somewhat than medical. It’s not scientific. There is something else going on and it is pretty bizarre. We can now prescribe things as a result of pharmacies they made use of to vilify. But because our whole health care establishment has now decided that ivermectin need to be killed, pharmacists now have a challenge with ivermectin.”

    According to Haider, the objective of what he described as the “medical misinformation bill” in entrance of the California Legislature is to prevent physicians from declaring points that the state deems to be disinformation. “That,” he claimed, “begs the dilemma of who decides what is the truth?”

    Dr. Anthony Fauci, director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases testifies, during a Senate Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions Committee hearing on Capitol Hill on Jan. 11, 2022
    Dr. Anthony Fauci, director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Conditions, testifies through a Senate Well being, Education and learning, Labor, and Pensions Committee hearing on Capitol Hill on Jan. 11, 2022 (Shawn Thew/Getty Pictures)

    “In any scientific discipline or endeavor, there is no complete fact,” he defined, asserting that “Dr. Fauci is not science, like he claims to be.”

    “He does not have the past phrase on what scientific truth is. We’re often getting closer to the reality, but we have in no way arrived at a remaining truth in medication. So, there normally has to be area for debate. Doctors have to be ready to take a number of unique sides of an argument. So medical professionals have to be capable to hash factors out amid them selves and to prescribe off-label. You simply cannot one out one particular condition and say, ‘This is off restrictions for the way we’ve performed medication for the earlier 100 a long time.’ Clients ought to be able to seek the advice of with their doctor, focus on therapies and threats, and make conclusions without the need of the interference of the authorities.

    “In just about each and every clinic and clinic in the United States appropriate now, it is thought of to be some sort of misinformation or disinformation to say just about anything other than the vaccines are protected and effective,” Haider pointed out. “To say there are any challenges connected with the vaccines is claimed to be misinformation or disinformation, and the working definition of misinformation or disinformation seems to be nearly anything that would prevent an individual from submitting to or doubting the Fda and CDC rules and recommendations.”

    This bill would have an impact on any medical professional accredited in California, such as Haider.

    If AB 2098 becomes legislation, any medical professional who prescribes ivermectin—even at the request of their patient—can get rid of their license to observe medicine in California.

    “Once you eliminate your license in a single state and you have licenses to follow in other states, you have to report that you lost your license in California to each other condition you are accredited in, and then just about every healthcare board will start out inquiring questions like, ‘Why did you shed your license in California.’ When the snowball starts off rolling, depending on what the professional medical board thinks about the reasoning at the rear of the decline of your license in California, you can lose all of your licenses.”

    In the wake of the pandemic, Haider pointed out how the country has been even more compromised by unprecedented delays in provide traces. We no for a longer time have domestic manufacturing of almost any medications, together with and especially antibiotics. In fact, China has captured in excess of 97 per cent of the U.S. industry for antibiotics. In the setting of runaway inflation, foodstuff shortages, and soaring gas price ranges, it is effortless to picture an The us in which pharmacy cabinets are bare, or with confined stock and massive price raises.

    If AB 2098 becomes regulation, the precedent that would be set is California will get to turn into the proving grounds for new legislation, not just in medicine, but in all the things, Haider stated.

    “Once you make this inroad in violation of doctor autonomy on how to handle COVID for their people, that could just be the starting,” Haider warned. “What about immediately after that? Do you go just after a doctor’s means to prescribe off-label for everything? Do we have to be limited to what has been Food and drug administration permitted for any indication? What takes place when we never have an on-label drug for the treatment of an indication? What then? How do we treat our sufferers then?”

    The Epoch Periods has attained out to California Assemblyman Evan Reduced (D-Cupertino), sponsor of the Assembly model of the bill, as very well as the Health-related Board of California.

    Patricia Tolson

    Stick to

    Patricia Tolson, an award-profitable nationwide investigative reporter with 20 many years of encounter, has worked for this sort of news stores as Yahoo!, U.S. Information, and The Tampa Free of charge Push. With The Epoch Moments, Patricia’s in-depth investigative coverage of human curiosity stories, election policies, schooling, faculty boards, and parental rights has achieved worldwide publicity. Send her your tale ideas: [email protected]
  • NC Senate Republicans float Medicaid expansion bill

    NC Senate Republicans float Medicaid expansion bill

    By Rose Hoban and Rachel Crumpler

    It finally happened.

    In a move that many health care advocates have been pushing for years, the state Senate introduced a bill on Wednesday that would expand the state’s Medicaid program to some half million-plus low-income North Carolinians.

    Until this point, Medicaid has been reserved mostly for children from low-income families along with a small number of parents in those families, poor seniors and people with disabilities. Since 2012, the possibility to sweep in many low-income workers has been on the table as a result of the Affordable Care Act, but Republican leaders in the state senate have been staunch opponents. 

    Now, after years of saying no, powerful Republicans in the state Senate are saying yes.

    “Why now? Why this? First, we need coverage in North Carolina for the working poor,” said state Senate leader Phil Berger (R-Eden), who admitted during a press conference Wednesday that he has likely been the most outspoken person in the state about his opposition to Medicaid expansion.

    “Second, there is no fiscal risk to the state budget moving forward with this proposal,” Berger added, noting that the bill includes pay-fors that would have hospitals largely on the hook to pay the 10 percent of the costs for the expansion population not covered by an enhanced federal payment. There’s also a federal incentive that would total some $1.5 billion in extra funds that would flow to North Carolina over a two-year period.

    Finally, he argued that since the state has moved Medicaid from being a state-run fee-for-service program to one managed by commercial insurance companies, the program has been “reformed and transformed.” 

    “Medicaid expansion has now evolved to a point that it is good state fiscal policy,” Berger continued. “But again, I cannot emphasize this enough: Expanding Medicaid needs to happen with additional reforms.”

    Those reforms could make the bill to be titled Expanding Access to Healthcare in North Carolina a hard pill for many to swallow. One aspect of the bill would set up a work requirement for the new beneficiaries, something that’s been repeatedly struck down in other states by federal judges. 

    What really might jeopardize passage of the bill is that it contains provisions that already are raising hackles in some powerful health care lobbies, including those that advocate for the state’s physicians and hospitals. 

    Resistance from doctors

    One reform proposed in the 33-page bill would make it possible for advanced practice nurses such as nurse practitioners, nurse midwives and certified registered nurse anesthetists (CRNAs) to practice without having a contract with a physician for their supervision.

    Physician and nursing groups have been divided over the so-called SAVE Act for years, with medical providers — led by the North Carolina Medical Society — usually being able to stop the nurses from having more leeway in their practices. At a Senate Health Care Committee hearing held after the press conference, several Democratic lawmakers also expressed reservations over this part of the bill. 

    Chip Baggett, head of the North Carolina Medical Society, also spoke out about the nursing practice language in the bill at the committee. He had a number of problems with the changes.

    “The first is the foundational education that is received by APRNs, many of which are receiving online education right now, and we do not think that provides the foundation necessary for independent decision making,” Baggett added after the meeting.

    Several decades of research, though, bolster the nurses’ contention that their practices are safe, and that patient satisfaction with advanced practice nurses is often better than for physicians.

    Joyce Krawiec, a Republican state senator from Kernersville, noted that 137 health care facilities across North Carolina only have CRNAs to deliver anesthesia services and that 34 other states have already loosened the rules around nursing practice.

    “My husband had a colonoscopy recently, and they can do it with the supervision of a physician,” Krawiec said. She recounted how she asked the physician leading the procedure if he was overseeing the anesthesia. He responded, “Heavens, no, I don’t supervise her. He said I haven’t looked at anesthesiology since I was in medical school. I wouldn’t know what to do. She does it all on her own.”

    Sen. Ralph Hise (R-Spruce Pine) argued that making it easier for nurses to practice, particularly in rural burgs, needed to be included in any bill that would make it easier for more people to see those providers. 

    “Finding nurses in this state is becoming more and more impossible,” Hise said. “And so this bill, allowing the nursing profession to expand its scope, to have more upward mobility in the nursing program is what ultimately I think will allow us to provide a lot of health care that we currently just don’t do.”

    Rep. Gale Adcock (D-Cary), who is also a nurse practitioner, said that increasing access to health insurance would require adding providers. 

    “The majority of folks clearly understand these things all need to happen at the same time, and I’m excited to see that it might happen soon,” she said.

    Hospitals, House objecting?

    One of the big obstacles to Medicaid expansion that Republican lawmakers have raised for years has been where the 10 percent of the expansion cost not covered by the federal government would come from. For years, lawmakers have argued that hospitals would be the main beneficiaries of more federal dollars for Medicaid flowing to the state, so hospitals could foot much of the bill in the form of an additional assessment.

    Hospitals have said they lose so much on uninsured patients that they were willing to pay for some of the cost, but not the whole tab. In Medicaid expansion bills in other years, this cost was also borne by a new tax on commercial managed care companies providing coverage under the “transformed” Medicaid program.

    Rep. Tim Moore (R-Kings Mountain), speaker of the North Carolina House of Representatives, told reporters on Wednesday afternoon that he didn’t think members of his caucus had an appetite for Medicaid expansion this year. Photo credit: Rachel Crumpler

    Hise contended the proposal will definitely help hospitals’ bottom lines, with more federal money flowing into the health care systems than they’ll have to put out to cover the rest of the Medicaid expansion population.

    A spokesman from the NC Healthcare Association, which represents the state’s hospitals, told NC Health News that his organization was reviewing the new bill and would wait to offer comment on its potential impact.

    The other big obstacle to passage of the bill may come from the other side of the General Assembly building in Raleigh, in the House of Representatives. Leaders there have expressed hesitation about making such a big policy change during this year’s short legislative session. 

    “The position of the House is we have no plans to take up expansion in the short session,” Rep. Donny Lambeth (R-Winston-Salem) said in a text to NC Health News. 

    Lambeth has been leading a committee with members from the House and Senate since January that has been examining what it would mean for the state to expand Medicaid. 

    “The work of the committee has not been finished and the committee has made no recommendations,” Lambeth continued. 

    The line from Lambeth and others on the House side has been that they’d rather come back for a special session on health care access in the fall. That, however, has drawn misgivings from state health leaders.

    “I mean, September sounds nice,” Health and Human Services Sec. Kody Kinsley said last week. “But here’s why I’m worried. First and foremost, this $1.5 billion dollar signing bonus that’s on the table right now. Right now, the money that is earmarked for North Carolina is nothing more than, you know, some print on a piece of paper. And it would not be hard for Congress to take that off the table, so they can invest it in other things they need to invest in. We cannot wait.”

  • Senate narrowly adopts bill affirming access to off-label drugs for COVID-19

    Senate narrowly adopts bill affirming access to off-label drugs for COVID-19

    TOPEKA — A Kansas state senator amid well being professionals investigated by the Board of Healing Arts for alleged misconduct during the COVID-19 pandemic voted early Thursday for legislation to legalize the prescribing by doctors and dispensing by pharmacists of treatment for off-label use from the coronavirus.

    The bill adopted by the Senate on a vote of 21-16 would mandate kid treatment services and K-12 public educational facilities to acknowledge — without the need of inquiry or scrutiny — the spiritual objection of moms and dads or guardians to vaccination of their kids versus a collection of maladies.

    Steffen, a Republican from Hutchinson and licensed anesthesiologist, had launched legislation that would retroactively shield him and other health companies who approved ivermectin or hydroxychloroquine in the course of the pandemic from investigation by regulators with the Kansas Board of Healing Arts.

    In January, Steffen explained he was below investigation by the BOHA. He has asserted physicians should not be confined in the selection of potential treatment method possibilities in a pandemic linked with a lot more than 8,000 fatalities and 19,000 hospitalizations in Kansans.

    “Thousands of Kansans and hundreds of thousands of Americans have died needlessly because mainstream educational medicine’s shutdown of successful therapy protocols,” Steffen stated. “This fearful, greedy, political and incompetent shutdown of early treatment will be considered a nationwide tragedy in time.”

    Steffen has waged a protracted war of text with general public health officials and clinical professionals who expressed reservations about alternative therapy of COVID-19. University of Kansas Wellbeing Program submitted testimony opposing the laws on behalf of Ascension Via Christi Overall health, College of Kansas College of Health Professions  and University of Kansas doctors.

    Sen. Kristen O'Shea, a Topeka Republican who periodically brings her young baby to the Senate floor, voted against a bill undermining the state's child immunization programs by undoing "proven medical advances that generations before us invested in." (Sherman Smith/Kansas Reflector)
    Sen. Kristen O’Shea, a Topeka Republican who periodically delivers her youthful child to the Senate ground, voted versus a invoice undermining the state’s baby immunization programs by undoing “proven healthcare developments that generations before us invested in.” (Sherman Smith/Kansas Reflector)

    The retroactive provision sought by Steffen, viewed as a conflict of interest for him, was taken out from the monthly bill despatched to the Home. The measure would allow Kansas physicians to prescribe medications, authorized by the U.S. Food items and Drug Administration, for off-label or option use to protect against or deal with COVID-19 an infection. The two hydroxychloroquine and ivermectin were shown as eligible below the monthly bill, which otherwise minimal medical doctors addressing coronavirus only when it came to prescribing controlled substances.

    The Senate invoice also was controversial mainly because it would amend point out regulation to prohibit pharmacists from refusing to fill or refill prescriptions for remedies based only on knowledge or assumption the drug would be used by a patient for therapy of COVID-19.

    Below 1 hypothetical example, a Senate opponent of the invoice stated the laws could call for a pharmacist to fill a prescription for an abortion capsule even if that pharmacist had a spiritual objection to abortion.

    Sen. Richard Hilderbrand, R-Baxter Springs, explained about 20{fe463f59fb70c5c01486843be1d66c13e664ed3ae921464fa884afebcc0ffe6c} of prescriptions were for off-label use. He mentioned medical professionals should not be investigated by the Board of Healing Arts for what they did in response to COVID-19. He claimed it was similar to a man or woman driving 24 miles per hour in a 25-mph zone — there’s nothing at all for law enforcement to investigate due to the fact there was no infraction.

    “I have hundreds of letters from pharmacists that are not supportive of this invoice,” mentioned Sen. Pat Pettey, a Democrat from Kansas Town, Kansas who voted against the invoice.

    Shawnee Republican Sen. Mike Thompson, a previous television weather forecaster who joined Steffen past year at an anti-vaccination discussion board in Johnson County, claimed he personally understood people who covertly took medicines into hospitals to give to people today severely sick with COVID-19. It was not crystal clear what medicine have been trafficked into hospitals that Thompson claimed have been capable to assist “people survive.”

    “They perform,” he explained. “They’re useful.”

    In addition, the Senate laws would exempt little ones and students enrolling in boy or girl care amenities, preschools, day care facilities or K-12 public universities from immunizations required by the secretary of Kansas Department of Well being and Ecosystem. The exemption, advocates reported, was vital to avoid those amenities from trampling a person’s sincerely held religious beliefs. In Kansas, people today can secure vaccination exemptions from educational facilities and other services.

    “No a single will give you a litmus examination,” reported Hilderbrand, who carried the invoice on the Senate ground. “Nobody has the ideal to concern your faith.”

    The definition of spiritual belief was broadly said in the monthly bill to include things like “theistic and non-theistic moral and ethical beliefs as to what is appropriate and wrong that are sincerely held with the energy of common religious views.”

    Sen. Mike Thompson, a Shawnee Republican, supported a bill authorizing physicians and pharmacists to meet patient demand for off-label drugs in the COVID-19 pandemic and said he knew of people who secretly brought medications into hospitals to help COVID-19 patients. (Tim Carpenter/Kansas Reflector)
    Sen. Mike Thompson, a Shawnee Republican, supported a invoice authorizing doctors and pharmacists to meet individual need for off-label medications in the COVID-19 pandemic and reported he realized of men and women who secretly brought drugs into hospitals to aid COVID-19 patients. (Tim Carpenter/Kansas Reflector)

    Sen. Kristen O’Shea, a Topeka Republican who a short while ago gave delivery, claimed she ran for the Senate in element to make specified federal government didn’t hurt smaller businesses throughout the up coming public well being unexpected emergency. She joined four other Republicans and 11 Democrats in voting against the monthly bill.

    She reported the responsibility to correctly govern throughout disaster “should not be employed as a car or truck to undo the verified professional medical advances that generations prior to us have invested in.”

    Sen. Cindy Holscher, D-Overland Park, stated doctors and pharmacists experienced authority to make accessible to sufferers off-label medications, but people overall health specialists understood they would be issue to consequences of their actions. She stated a Kansas pharmacist questioning the Senate invoice indicated a doctor wrote a prescription for 18 occasions the proposed dose of ivermectin — a perhaps deadly dose.

    Holscher mentioned the Senate invoice was “dangerous” simply because it unraveled verified strategies of disease regulate by immunization programs amongst little ones in Kansas.

    In other action prior to adjourning the late-night time session, the Senate accepted 24-15 a invoice stripping the KDHE secretary of authority to choose motion to prevent infectious or contagious health conditions. As a substitute, KDHE would post a report to the Senate president and Residence speaker recommending regulations or regulations in reaction to general public health emergencies. In addition, the invoice would strip community wellness officials of electrical power to prohibit public gatherings or require isolation or quarantining of infected folks.