“Schedule 1 drugs have no medical value and high potential for abuse.”
But they put Marijuana there, anyway. Some proven medical value, and little or no potential for abuse.
So, they can put any drug they want to on Sch 1.
Why? The law says the the DEA and the FDA have the authority to classify drugs as Schedule 1. The DEA has gone on record stating it can interpret the law broadly.
From the official DEA governmental website:
“The abuse rate is a determinate factor in the scheduling of the drug; for example, Schedule I drugs have a high potential for abuse and the potential to create severe psychological and/or physical dependence.‘
There cannot be made a case that women have or will become physically or psychologically dependent on Ru 486. It isn’t going to be made a Schedule 1 drug.
Neither can a case be made that there is no medical use for it, so exactly how do you think that the Schedule1 scare scenario is going to happen?
Big Pharma profits from it being right where it is.
Does marijuana have a high potential for abuse or to create dependence? No, not by any scientific standard. But the DEA has officially taken the position that if a drug “has at least some potential for abuse” then it can deem that a high enough potential to classify it as a Schedule 1 drug if it wishes to do so.
So the normal procedure for taking mifepristone (RU-486) is to take it in combination with another drug, misoprostol. Taking mifepristone by itself can cause a fetus to have birth defects without causing an abortion. Mifepristone can also be used as a treatment for some forms of diabetes (although it’s not used to treat pregnant women for obvious reasons).
So the DEA could invent a scenario where the drug might be abused. Suppose a physician decided to prescribe mifepristone to a pregnant patient? That’s not something any responsible physicians would do. But it is possible. So the DEA could argue the drug has at least some potential to be abused; which is all the justification they claim they need.
Abuse is physical or psychological dependence, as defined by the DEA. What is described above is misuse, harm, caused by a prescriber.
Any drug has the potential to be harmfully mis-prescribed by an inept or malpracticing prescriber. They aren’t going to put every drug in Schedule 1 because of your misbegotten scenario.
Reread the policy you quoted above. The DEA wrote about the potential for abuse and the potential for creating dependence. So they are saying they see these as two separate items.
That’s a slippery slope argument. No, they’re not going to put every drug in Schedule 1. But they are saying they have the authority to put a drug in Schedule 1 on what is essentially a pretext if they want to do so.
And this is not just theory. There was public support for classifying marijuana as a Schedule 1 drug and they bent the text of the law to do so. There would be public support for classifying RU486 as a Schedule 1 drug so they might bend the text of the law again.
How does that fit with marijuana? It has less potential for abuse than lite beer, and has zero severe psychological and/or physical dependence.‘
Face it, if they can put hemp on Sch1, they can put anything on it.
There was public support for marijuana on the Schedule 1 list but not any more. And is there really public support, at least widespread public support, for scheduling RU486? I guess I’m not understanding how we got from discussing a reactionary court overturning Roe to a Democratic congress suddenly upholding – or making worse – reactionary pharmaceutical legislation.
If abortion is made to be illegal through “public support”, then a drug that causes abortion would also have public support to be made illegal.
How could they prove it? In those states, women would take home pregnancy tests. If positive, they make a trip to a free state, have the procedure and come home. How is the shithole state any wiser?
That’s kind of my point. There doesn’t appear to be public support for overturning Roe. It’s just something that conservatives may have wrangled for a minority of the public through their political machinations.
We are talking about a situation where Roe has been overturned.
If it has been overturned, then it will be claimed that there is public support for overturning it, just as the Republicans claim public support for anything that they do.
I don’t see what would hold back an anti-abortion Republican administration from instructing the DEA to schedule any sort of abortifacient drug.
There’s pretty heavy public support for legalizing marijuana, and yet, it’s still schedule 1. Republicans don’t actually have to have public support to claim that they do.
I imagine a fair number of them that aren’t in super-Red states were never repealed out of an expectation that RvW wouldn’t ever actually be reversed by SCOTUS, and as a result, was a political fight that the Dems in those states didn’t feel like they needed to fight.
I’m surprised to see South Korea on the list of countries where abortion is restricted except in cases where the life of the mother is at risk. For anyone with knowledge of the situation, is this mostly due to Christian / Catholic fundamentalism? I know South Korea has a lot of Christians and Catholics, but I didn’t think their influence was that great. I tend to think of South Korea more as a progressive nation like those of Western Europe and Scandinavia.
Given the hypothetical that Republicans will be the administration in power, I agree with your prediction. I just don’t believe the hypothetical.
And Dems will get there eventually on descheduling marijuana. They’ve been a disappointment so far but it will dawn on them sometime, perhaps when the last of the old guard is gone, that it is a winning issue for them, or at least poses no danger in supporting.
It would be a matter of money. A well-off woman could get some cash out of the bank and drive on over to Raton or Walsenburg, where they could get a legal termination, go home and no one would have to know. A less well-off woman would have to get help from friends, so there would be people who could testify against her. Hence, a law of that sort is designed as morality theatre that shits on poor people while protecting white affluenza.
A Federal law that makes crossing state lines to get one illegal. Or one that requires Doctors in the free state to inform the residency state.
Indeed, just the opposite:U.S. Public Continues to Favor Legal Abortion, Oppose Overturning Roe v. Wade | Pew Research Center
As debates over abortion continue in states around the country, a majority of Americans (61%) continue to say that abortion should be legal in all (27%) or most (34%) cases. A smaller share of the public (38%) says abortion should be illegal in all (12%) or most cases (26%).
You are blaming the descheduling of marijuana on the Dems? In every state they have control, it’s been done- to some extent. The Dems dont control the Senate or the White House, so they can’t. It is the GOP who is blocking this.
True, I was talking about a situation where republicans would have power over the DEA. Hopefully, that will not be the case.
However, wouldn’t states still be allowed to make laws about what was legal in their state?
It may not make DEA schedule, but it could still be illegal to buy, possess, or use.