Colorado Funding Millions for Marijuana Research

According to the Denver Post, Colorado is about to spend $9 million to research the effects of marijuana. Governor John Hickenlooper signed a bill this year that will allow the state health department to give out $9 million in grants for the next five years for marijuana studies. These studies are expected to include clinical trials on the marijuana products specifically sold in Colorado.

Since medical marijuana first came into thought nearly 20 years ago, research on it has been very polarized. These new studies will be used to help determine if the marijuana being used in Colorado has different effects than the government used marijuana for specific studies years ago. California attempted to study these effects over the last 12 years. Spending over $8 million in research they came to some conclusions. These conclusions are as follows; certain doses of smoked marijuana could relieve pain, and vaporized marijuana was safer on people’s lungs. Colorado wants to expand on this research by using some of the registration fees medical marijuana patients have paid.

The health department hopes to start accepting applications for researchers starting towards the middle to end of this year. In hopes to have funds go out in early 2015 so that the research can begin. They are hoping to be able to fund 10 to 15 studies.

These studies will hopefully help to prove the effects of medical marijuana on all patients, which could lead to the federal government allow for the legalization of medical marijuana across the country.

Sources for this blog from John Ingold with The Denver Post. http://www.denverpost.com/marijuana/ci_25946384/colorado-preparing-spend-9-million-medical-marijuana-research