A federal health agency recently announced it would no longer provide government funds for state-run addiction programs that included medical cannabis as a treatment.<\/p>\n
Last week, federal officials with the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration (SAMHSA), the addiction treatment arm of the US Department of Health and Human Services, declared the new rule during a phone call with state officials. SAMHSA cited the federal law’s ban of marijuana and a lack of scientific evidence showing the plant\u2019s ability to curb opioid addiction as reasons to justify the new rule.<\/p>\n
“There’s zero evidence for that,” Dr. Elinore McCance-Katz, SAMHSA\u2019s Assistant Secretary for Mental Health and Substance Use, told NY Daily News<\/em><\/u><\/a>. “We felt that it was time to make it clear we did not want individuals receiving funds for treatment services to be exposed to marijuana and somehow given the impression that it’s a treatment.”<\/p>\n SAMHSA currently wields a $1.8 billion<\/u><\/a> budget just for combating opioid abuse and addiction in the US. The agency is requesting roughly $2 billion for the fiscal year of 2020 for fighting against the opioid epidemic.<\/p>\n