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Rick Doblin, PhD, President of the Multidisciplinary Association for Psychedelic Studies (MAPS), wrote in an undated article on the MAPS website, "NIDA Blocks Medical Marijuana Research" (accessed June 22, 2006):

“Dr. Abrams’ protocol design [for medical marijuana research on AIDS patients] had been extensively reviewed, critiqued, modified and approved by the FDA, the California Research Advisory Panel, the Institutional Review Board of UC San Francisco, and the Scientific Advisory Board of the San Francisco Community Consortium. None of these organizations has a reputation for laxness.

Early in the summer of 1994, DEA blocked the importation of marijuana from a licensed marijuana research firm in the Netherlands. In August, 1994, Dr. Abrams submitted a request for marijuana to NIDA, which is the sole domestic source of marijuana legal for clinical research…

On April 26, 1995, Dr. Abrams received a letter from … NIDA, rejecting his request for marijuana for his study…. claiming that Dr. Abrams’ study was scientifically flawed and therefore was not worthy of any of NIDA’s limited supply of marijuana…

None of the supposed scientific deficiencies in Dr. Abrams’ protocol … were raised by the FDA or any of the other regulatory bodies… NIDA is not the government agency charged with determining if drugs are safe and effective for prescription availability, yet NIDA is seeking to require data that the FDA determined were not necessary.”

June 22, 2006