The Rundown

The DEA’s announcement was a response to two new petitions asking the agency to reclassify cannabis. The plant is currently a Schedule I illegal drug. Substances in that category are defined as drugs with no currently accepted medical use and a high potential for abuse.

Schedule I drugs are also considered the most dangerous of all drugs and they are usually accompanied by the heaviest criminal charges.

Critics of the U.S.’s cannabis laws have repeatedly asked the DEA to move marijuana out of the Schedule I category. Nevertheless, the agency once again denied those requests.

Here’s how the DEA explained its decision. “Marijuana will remain a schedule I controlled substance,” the agency said in a statement. “It does not have a currently accepted medical use in treatment in the United States, there is a lack of accepted safety for its use under medical supervision, and it has a high potential for abuse.”

DEA Attempts To Improve Cannabis Research

The DEA sad it will try to make it easier for scientists to study cannabis. Under current rules only the University of Mississippi can grow cannabis for research purposes. Many researchers say this system creates a lot of challenges that make it hard to carry out effective studies.

Now, the DEA it will allow more universities to grow cannabis for use in research. The agency said the change will make it possible for more research to be completed. If that research can produce enough evidence, the DEA said it might reconsider its decision.

“If the scientific understanding about marijuana changes—and it could change—then the decision could change,” the DEA’s statement said.

Critics Wanted More

Pro-cannabis lawmakers and activists said the DEA’s newest decisions simply aren’t enough.

“I welcome the decision to lessen barriers to marijuana research,” Oregon Congressman Earl Blumenauer said in a statement. Blumenauer helped to organize the most recent petitions to reclassify cannabis.

“However, this decision doesn’t go far enough and is further evidence that the DEA doesn’t get it. Keeping marijuana at Schedule I continues an outdated, failed approach.”

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Anissa Abi-Dargham, MD, said, “In light of the more widespread acceptance and use of marijuana, especially by young people, they believe it is important to look more closely at the potentially addictive effects of cannabis on key regions of the brain. She is a professor of psychiatry (in radiology) at Columbia University Medical Center (CUMC) and a lead author of the paper.

The study included 11 adults between the ages of 21 and 40 who were severely dependent on cannabis and 12 matched healthy controls. On average, the cannabis use group started using as early as age 16, became dependent on cannabis by age 20, and have been dependent for the past 7 years. In the month prior to the study, nearly all users in this study smoke marijuana on a daily basis.

Using positron emission tomography (PET) to track a radiolabelled molecule that binds to dopamine receptors in the brain, the scientists measured dopamine release in the striatum and its subregions, as well as in several brain regions outside the striatum, including the thalamus, midbrain, and globus pallidus. The cannabis users in this study stayed in the hospital for a week of abstinence to ensure that the PET scans were not measuring the acute effects of the drug. Participants were scanned before and after being given oral amphetamine to elicit dopamine release. The change in the binding of the raiotracer was taken in percentages as an indicator of capacity for dopamine release.

Compared to the control group, the cannabis users had significantly lower dopamine release in the striatum, including subregions involved in associative and sensorimotor learning, and in the globus pallidus.

The scientists also explored the relationship between dopamine release in a key area of the striatum and cognitive performance on learning and working memory tasks. Although there was no difference between groups in task performance, lower dopamine release in all participants was associated with worse performance on both tasks.

“We don’t know whether decreases dopamine was a preexisting condition or the result of heavy cannabis use,” said Dr. Abi-Dargham. “But the bottom line is that long-term, heavy cannabis use may impair the dopaminergic system, which could have a variety of negative effects on learning and behavior.”

Jeffrey Lieberman, MD, Chair of Psychiatry at CUMC and past president of the American Psychiatric Association, noted that “these findings add to the growing body of research demonstrating the potentially adverse effects of cannabis, particularly in youth, at the same time that government policies and laws are increasing access and use.”

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