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University Unveils Free Narcan Vending Machine
Santa Clara University’s free Narcan vending machine could save lives.
The future is now: Vending machines in 2023 dispense cannabis, beer, art, cupcakes, and now the life-saving drug Narcan, as we race into an automated world.
Santa Clara University (SCU) in California announced the installation of a free on-campus vending machine that dispenses canisters of the opioid-overdose reversing medication Narcan.
“Naloxone is a miracle drug that can reverse an opioid overdose within minutes,” Santa Clara University Assistant Professor of Public Health Jamie Chang told NBC Bay Area. “To not provide this seemed really counterintuitive to a lot of public health principles.”
One of the goals is to avoid the stigma surrounding opioid overdoses, and instead see Narcan as a life-saving instant solution. The fact is that people die because friends are afraid to dial 911, or are unaware of Good Samaritan laws that protect people from trying to save a life from an overdose. But students need to have the Narcan on-hand in order to act fast in most situations.
“Our goal for this is to get naloxone out into the community because the more naloxone that people have in their hands, the more chances there are to save a life,” student Isabella Bunkers said.
The vending machine concept is likely coming to a university near you. The Mercury News reports that Stanford University plans to introduce one in a few weeks. “SCU is a party school, so drug use is something that we know happens on campus, off campus or near campus,” said Setareh Tehrani, who helped launch the project.
The idea was inspired by the death of Charlie Ternan, a former SCU student, who died of fentanyl poisoning while his friends thought he was asleep at an off-campus fraternity in 2020.
This arrives as one in five youth deaths in California are blamed on fentanyl and opioids, according to preliminary data from the California Department of Vital Statistics. Fentanyl killed a record 5,722 Californians in 2021, much more than the estimated 4,258 people who died in auto accidents in the state and more than twice the 2,548 killed in homicides.
You don’t even have to be looking for fentanyl to overdose from it: Two students at Ohio State University died from fentanyl overdoses, according to a May 5 announcement by the Columbus Police Department, and officials say the fentanyl was disguised as Adderall.
While Narcan can cost up to $150 without insurance, most students can’t afford the cost, which is one of the core purposes of the project. Additionally, when someone is overdosing on an opioid, fumbling around for a payment method might take too long to save a life.
“The first thing is that it’s free, and it’s in a place that is widely accessible to students,” said Chang, who helped launch the campus vending machine. “(But even) regardless of whether or not students decide to take the Naloxone, we’re hoping that it at least sends the message that they need to take this seriously and that there are tools out there for them.”
Under California’s Senate Bill 367, public colleges in California, public schools are required to provide access to Narcan on campuses. Some high schools in the state are taking the initiative to provide Narcan for students.
Santa Clara County is considering installing similar vending machines on high school campuses.
“People are more aware of fentanyl. We’ve talked about it everywhere, from Greek life to club sports to varsity sports,” said Olivia Pruett, a senior who studies public health. But Narcan “is only effective if people have it when they need it. This conversation has to keep happening.”
Meanwhile, lawmakers in Minnesota are trying to pass a bill that would require schools in the state to have the opioid overdose reversal drug Narcan available in the event of an emergency situation.
Source: https://hightimes.com/news/university-unveils-free-narcan-vending-machine/
New Mexico regulators fined a cannabis operator nearly $300,000 and revoked its license after the company allegedly created fake reports in the state’s traceability software.
The New Mexico Cannabis Control Division (CCD) accused marijuana manufacturer and retailer Golden Roots of 11 violations, according to Albuquerque Business First.
Golden Roots operates the The Cannabis Revolution Dispensary.
The majority of the violations are related to the Albuquerque company’s improper use of BioTrack, which has been New Mexico’s track-and-trace vendor since 2015.
The CCD alleges Golden Roots reported marijuana production only two months after it had received its vertically integrated license, according to Albuquerque Business First.
Because cannabis takes longer than two months to be cultivated, the CCD was suspicious of the report.
After inspecting the company’s premises, the CCD alleged Golden Roots reported cultivation, transportation and sales in BioTrack but wasn’t able to provide officers who inspected the site evidence that the operator was cultivating cannabis.
In April, the CCD revoked Golden Roots’ license and issued a $10,000 fine, according to the news outlet.
The company requested a hearing, which the regulator scheduled for Sept. 1.
At the hearing, the CCD testified that the company’s dried-cannabis weights in BioTrack were suspicious because they didn’t seem to accurately reflect how much weight marijuana loses as it dries.
Company employees also poorly accounted for why they were making adjustments in the system of up to 24 pounds of cannabis, making comments such as “bad” or “mistake” in the software, Albuquerque Business First reported.
Golden Roots was fined $298,972.05 – the amount regulators allege the company made selling products that weren’t properly accounted for in BioTrack.
The CCD has been cracking down on cannabis operators accused of selling products procured from out-of-state or not grown legally:
- Regulators alleged in August that Albuquerque dispensary Sawmill Sweet Leaf sold out-of-state products and didn’t have a license for extraction.
- Paradise Exotics Distro lost its license in July after regulators alleged the company sold products made in California.
Golden Roots was the first alleged rulebreaker in New Mexico to be asked to pay a large fine.
Source: https://mjbizdaily.com/new-mexico-cannabis-operator-fined-loses-license-for-alleged-biotrack-fraud/
Four marijuana companies, including a multistate operator, have filed a lawsuit against U.S. Attorney General Merrick Garland in which they allege the federal MJ prohibition under the Controlled Substances Act is no longer constitutional.
According to the complaint, filed Thursday in U.S. District Court in Massachusetts, retailer Canna Provisions, Treevit delivery service CEO Gyasi Sellers, cultivator Wiseacre Farm and MSO Verano Holdings Corp. are all harmed by “the federal government’s unconstitutional ban on cultivating, manufacturing, distributing, or possessing intrastate marijuana.”
Verano is headquartered in Chicago but has operations in Massachusetts; the other three operators are based in Massachusetts.
The lawsuit seeks a ruling that the “Controlled Substances Act is unconstitutional as applied to the intrastate cultivation, manufacture, possession, and distribution of marijuana pursuant to state law.”
The companies want the case to go before the U.S. Supreme Court.
They hired prominent law firm Boies Schiller Flexner to represent them.
The New York-based firm’s principal is David Boies, whose former clients include Microsoft, former presidential candidate Al Gore and Elizabeth Holmes’ disgraced startup Theranos.
Similar challenges to the federal Controlled Substances Act (CSA) have failed.
One such challenge led to a landmark Supreme Court decision in 2005.
In Gonzalez vs. Raich, the highest court in the United States ruled in a 6-3 decision that the commerce clause of the U.S. Constitution gave Congress the power to outlaw marijuana federally, even though state laws allow the cultivation and sale of cannabis.
In the 18 years since that ruling, 23 states and the District of Columbia have legalized adult-use marijuana and the federal government has allowed a multibillion-dollar cannabis industry to thrive.
Since both Congress and the U.S. Department of Justice, currently headed by Garland, have declined to intervene in state-licensed marijuana markets, the key facts that led to the Supreme Court’s 2005 ruling “no longer apply,” Boies said in a statement Thursday.
“The Supreme Court has since made clear that the federal government lacks the authority to regulate purely intrastate commerce,” Boies said.
“Moreover, the facts on which those precedents are based are no longer true.”
Verano President Darren Weiss said in a statement the company is “prepared to bring this case all the way to the Supreme Court in order to align federal law with how Congress has acted for years.”
While the Biden administration’s push to reschedule marijuana would help solve marijuana operators’ federal tax woes, neither rescheduling nor modest Congressional reforms such as the SAFER Banking Act “solve the fundamental issue,” Weiss added.
“The application of the CSA to lawful state-run cannabis business is an unconstitutional overreach on state sovereignty that has led to decades of harm, failed businesses, lost jobs, and unsafe working conditions.”
Alabama regulators are targeting Dec. 1 to award the first batch of medical cannabis business licenses after the agency’s first two attempts were scrapped because of scoring errors and litigation.
The first licenses will be awarded to individual cultivators, delivery providers, processors, dispensaries and state testing labs, according to the Alabama Medical Cannabis Commission (AMCC).
Then, on Dec. 12, the AMCC will award licenses for vertically integrated operations, a designation set primarily for multistate operators.
Licenses are expected to be handed out 28 days after they have been awarded, so MMJ production could begin in early January, according to the Alabama Daily News.
That means MMJ products could be available for patients around early March, an AMCC spokesperson told the media outlet.
Regulators initially awarded 21 business licenses in June, only to void them after applicants alleged inconsistencies with how the applications were scored.
Then, in August, the state awarded 24 different licenses – 19 went to June recipients – only to reverse themselves again and scratch those licenses after spurned applicants filed lawsuits.
A state judge dismissed a lawsuit filed by Chicago-based MSO Verano Holdings Corp., but another lawsuit is pending.
Source: https://mjbizdaily.com/alabama-plans-to-award-medical-cannabis-licenses-dec-1/
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