Wednesday, November 11th, 2009
(This is the second of two guest blogs by M. Backes concerning medical cannabis safety. Read the previous blog.)
Questions:
Should California state and local officials be concerned about pesticide contamination on medical cannabis?
How does the risk of contaminated cannabis (an unregulated agricultural product) compare with risk associated with regulated agricultural products?
Answers:
California has the strictest pesticide regulations in the nation and these regulations are supervised by the California Department of Pesticide Regulation (CDPR). CDPR makes purchases of produce from California supermarkets and tests this produce for pesticide residues.
Over 30% of California produce purchased from supermarkets has been shown by CDPR testing to possess legal levels of pesticide residues.
1% of all CDPR tested produce, purchased in supermarkets, is found to contain illegal levels of pesticide residues.
The Los Angeles City Attorney’s office found 5.25% of the cannabis samples tested from purchases made at Los Angeles dispensaries (3 out of 52 samples) to contain pesticide residues. Legal thresholds of pesticide residue on cannabis have not yet been established by the EPA or CDPR. By comparison, when the CDPR tests fresh ginger root purchased from California supermarkets, it has found that 5% of samples contain illegally high levels of pesticide residues.
The important consideration is that we are comparing the contamination rates of an unregulated agricultural product (cannabis) with a regulated agricultural product (ginger root).
94.75% of medical cannabis sampled from Los Angeles dispensaries was found to be clean and within California standards for any agricultural product, without any regulation whatsoever. That is remarkable, because it means that nearly all California cannabis producers are currently producing pure cannabis. With sensible and simple regulation, we should easily bring this purity level to 100%.
While politicians should be concerned about the potential for contamination on cannabis, the only solution to prevent this contamination is regulation of how medical cannabis is dispensed. One of the biggest advantages of regulating non-profit dispensaries comes from the oversight provided by intelligent regulation.
Our Los Angeles City Attorney, Carmen Trutanich, has made quite a fuss over pesticide contaminated cannabis. Mr. Trutanich, an avid cigar smoker, might wish to be more concerned about the thirteen different pesticides that tobacco companies regularly use on the crop that comprises his stogie. According to the federal General Accounting Office, twenty-five million pounds of pesticide are used on tobacco crops in the US each year. Tobacco pesticides include some of the most dangerous pesticides used in the United States, according the GAO. These tobacco pesticides can cause acute poisoning, cancer, nervous system damage and birth defects. Mr. Trutanich doesn’t have to spray his cigar with his trusty can of Raid, the prop he used on Fox News to warn of contaminated cannabis, since his cigar already contains plenty of pesticides…
Sources:
California Department of Pesticide Regulation website
Associated Press: “Federal oversight on tobacco pesticides inadequate, report says.” 25 April 2003 – Siobhan McDonough, Associated Press
Posted in Medical Marijuana Information | 1 Comment »
Thursday, October 15th, 2009
(This is a guest blog by M. Backes, responding to allegations by City Attorney Carmen Trutanich about pesticides on medical cannabis.)
LA City Attorney, Carmen “Nuch” Trutanich, has been all over the media trying to convince Los Angeles that a pesticide used to kill Mexican fire ants is evidence that medical cannabis provided by dispensaries is poisonous and supporting Mexican drug cartels. Having abandoned the flawed interpretation of the California Supreme Court’s decision in People v. Mentch, Mr. Trutanich and LA County District Attorney Steve Cooley have now latched onto toxic reefer as their latest justification for shuttering LA’s pot shops.
According to Trutanich, three samples of medical marijuana from “controlled buys” by undercover LAPD were tested by an FDA laboratory. On these samples, Mr Trutanich said the lab found high concentrations of an insecticide used to kill fire ants in Mexico. Trutanich claims this Mexican fire ant insecticide is evidence that LA medical cannabis is being supplied by the Mexican drug cartels.
Except…
There are no Mexican fire ants. There is the notorious red imported fire ant - solenopsis invicta – but that’s from Brazil, not Mexico. Those fire ants were accidently imported into the US in the 1930′s then spread across the southern United States. Fire ants were never found in Mexico, until they crossed the Texas border into northern Mexico a few years back. But even if expatriate Texan fire ants have decamped to Mexico, what does that prove about the origin of marijuana in Los Angeles dispensaries? If a cannabis dispensary uses chopsticks to pull marijuana buds from jars does that mean that the marijuana is being supplied by Chinese spies?
Pesticide testing is not a trivial exercise. It requires big, expensive, exquisitely sensitive machines that are capable of detecting just a few molecules. More importantly, pesticide testing requires a large plant sample to produce precise results. EMA, the largest testing lab in California requires a minimum 200 gram sample. So, did Los Angeles dispensaries sell Mr. Trutanich’s undercover cops three half-pound bags of weed? That’s an interesting scenario… ”I’ll take a brownie, an eighth of Kush, and… throw in half a pound of that Sour D.” It’s more likely that Mr. Trutanich would have had much smaller samples tested, with a much higher risk of error in the testing.
But what’s this insecticide poisoning cannabis patients in LA? Well, it’s a bit more complex than Mr Trutanich would have you believe. The insecticide that Nuch found in his big bag of herb was bifenthrin. Bifenthrin belongs to a very common class of insecticides called pyrethroids. The most common pyrethroid is pyrethrum, which is made from chrysanthemums. Pyrethrum is considered safe enough for use on organic fruits, herbs and vegetables throughout the world, including cannabis. See, most pyrethroids aren’t all that toxic, except to fish and some insects. However, they’re not that good at stopping fire ants. Nothing is.
What’s with this whole Mexican angle? Mr Trutanich claims that bifenthrim is not used in California and by implication that its use is restricted to less enlightened places, such as Mexico. But Mr. Trutanich is dead wrong. According to pesticideinfo.org, California farmers used 107,000 pounds of bifenthrim on their crops in 2007. They used it on corn, almonds, strawberries, even wine grapes. Fifty tons of it.
What messages should we take away from Trutanich’s Cassandra call? That the City Attorney and the County DA will say anything in their attempt to close LA’s medical cannabis collectives and that you might wish to keep medical cannabis away from your aquarium. Remember that in June 2009, state drug warriors had their budgets slashed 20% in Sacramento. Medical marijuana remains the lowest hanging fruit for prosecutors and narcs to make cases and boost their stats. Certainly easier than busting those Mexican drug cartels.
Trutanich stated to FOX NEWS “it’s not enough to say conclusively that this dope is coming from here (Mexico), okay. but? but, you know, if it quacks like a duck, walks like a duck, you know, chances are that if you look a little closer, you may be dealing with a duck.”
Well… if it thinks like a duck, it might be the LA City Attorney.
California cannabis patients should be protected from contaminants in their medicine. That protection comes from intelligent regulations, something that the City Attorney’s office has been stalling for two years. Perhaps it’s time we stopped wasting tax money busting legitimate medical marijuana facilities and started researching how cannabis can be used more effectively as a medicine.
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