Medicine

Chronic City: 'Truth In Trials' Bill Would Lift Ban On Medical Marijuana Evidence In Federal Court

​U.S. Representative Sam Farr (D-Carmel) and more than 20 bipartisan co-sponsors introduced legislation today that would allow defendants in medical marijuana cases the ability to use medical evidence at trial, a right they currently do not have. Due to the 2005 U.S. Supreme Court ruling in G ... More >>

Chronic City: L.A.'s Marijuana Dispensary Ban Could Cost City Millions

Los Angeles' proposed medical marijuana ordinance -- which would ban the sale of pot at dispensaries -- could cost the city $36 million to $74 million in lost sales tax, according to a marijuana advocacy group.Photo by lavocado, Wikimedia CommonsOpen for business on L.A.'s Ventura Boulevard... but f ... More >>

Chronic City: 77 Percent Of L.A. Residents Favor Dispensaries; Majority of West Coasters Want To Legalize Pot

Los Angeles County District Attorney Steve Cooley may have believed he was safely playing to the grandstands when he promised to shut down all of L.A.'s estimated 800 to 1,000 medical marijuana dispensaries, magnanimously declaring that "approximately zero" of the dispensaries were operating legally ... More >>

Chronic City: Feds Lighten Up On Medical Marijuana Just As L.A. Tightens The Screws

Photo by Rotbuche, Wikimedia CommonsLet my people grow.​In a stunning bit of role reversal, law enforcement officials in dispensary-heavy Los Angeles County are gearing up for a massive mobilization against hundreds of pot shops even while the Obama administration backs away from the federal gover ... More >>

Chronic City: The Results Are In -- Medical Marijuana Works

julianayrs.comYou can't argue with results.​"There's no proof that medical marijuana works. It needs more study. There's only anecdotal evidence. It doesn't treat specific conditions. People just want to get high." Every cannabis advocate and medical marijuana patient has run into these arguments, ... More >>

Chronic City: Fresno's Freakin' -- But Marijuana Dispensary To Stay Open

Medmar ClinicMedmar Clinic is under legal attack from the City of Fresno.​You've gotta pity the poor, put-upon city officials of Fresno. After all, they've only had 13 years to suss out Proposition 215, this newfangled medical marijuana law that's being forced upon their fair city by more progress ... More >>

Chronic City: Aptly Named 'Joint Resolution' Succeeds; California Senate Urges Change in Federal Medical Marijuana Rules

​By a 23-15 vote, the California State Senate yesterday approved a "joint resolution" urging the federal government to stop Drug Enforcement Agency (DEA) raids on medical marijuana patients and providers. The Sen. Mark Leno-authored resolution additionally calls for the nation to "create a compreh ... More >>

Chronic City: Marijuana Moratorium -- How To Ignore The Voters And The Law

Dispensary moratorium: Latest political fad?​One by one, across California, the lights are winking out.In city after city, town after town, patients who had dared hope they would at last have safe access to the medicine recommended by their physicians are having those hopes dashed  by politic ... More >>

Chronic City: Revealed -- California Cops Are Trained 'Marijuana Is Not A Medicine'

Artwork courtesy Jim WheelerCan't we all just get along?​A recent court case in San Diego has revealed some California police officers are basing their sworn court testimony in medical marijuana cases on badly outdated, legally inaccurate information.This goes a long way towards explaining why it ... More >>

Just Fantastic: $82.1 Million Cut to State's Office of AIDS

​Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger today signed a state budget that will cut roughly $82.1 million from the state's Office of AIDS, says that office's chief, Dr. Michelle Roland. The state cuts promise to disproportionately hit cities like San Francisco, which is among the nation's top ... More >>

Chronic City: To Tax Pot, Or Not? Oakland Votes Tuesday

Photo: chron.ronThe color of moneyMail-in voting closes Tuesday on Measure F, a new ordinance in Oakland which would impose a special tax on sales of medical marijuana in the city's dispensaries. The measure would make Oakland the first city in the United States to have a business tax category for m ... More >>

Mark Leno's Aptly Named 'Joint Resolution' In Support of Medical Pot Passes Senate Committee

Last month, we reported on a Mark Leno bill introduced simultaneously in the Assembly and Senate -- a "joint resolution." The moniker was especially fitting, however, because the resolution supported medical marijuana users, and called for an end to the federal crackdown on dispensaries. Well, when ... More >>

Chronic City: Court Says Patients Can Collectively Grow Medical Marijuana

photobucket.comOfficer, release that plantSome rural sheriff's departments still haven't really come to terms with the fact that medical marijuana is now legal in California, despite having had since 1996 to adjust to the concept. But in a landmark ruling, an appellate court today protected the righ ... More >>

Chronic City: The 'Oaksterdam Model' For Legal Pot In California

Oaksterdam UniversityWith Oakland broke and growing broker (like many other American cities), calls for the city to get into the growing and selling of medical marijuana are being taken more seriously.The idea seems a lot less crazy when you take a look at the potential revenue to be generated, espe ... More >>

Chronic City: Medical Marijuana Group Gets $139,000 In Attorneys Fees From Garden Grove; City Spent $250K In Legal Battle over $200 Worth of Pot

wikimedia.orgLeggo my indo.Will grass get you through times of no money better than money will get you through times of no grass? National medical marijuana advocacy group Americans for Safe Access (ASA) may not have to find out, as it just received $139,000 for attorney fees by the City of Garden G ... More >>

Chronic City: Dispensary Operator Charlie Lynch Gets 366 Days In Federal Prison

Reason.tvCharles Lynch In a courtroom crowded with spectators and supporters, Morro Bay medical marijuana dispensary owner Charles Lynch was sentenced today in federal court to one year and one day in prison.Lynch, 47, appeared this morning in the Los Angeles federal courtroom of U.S. District Judge ... More >>

Mark Leno Introduces 'Joint Resolution' Urging End to Crackdowns On Medical Pot. We Are Not Making This Up.

Sen. Mark Leno today announced he has introduced a "joint resolution" to end the federal crackdown on medical marijuana use in California. While this is a matter of serious legislation, one can't help but notice the howler of a marijuana-related "joint" resolution. Leno's spokeswoman, Ali Bay, confi ... More >>

Chronic City: Dispensary Ban -- Hey, Goleta, Nice Job Helping Patients!

The Goleta City Council has unanimously passed a "temporary" ban on medical marijuana dispensaries -- while still claiming the city is "voicing support" for medical marijuana patients.The Santa Barbara Independent reports that the council voted 5-0 in support of an ordinance banning dispensaries wit ... More >>

Chronic City: Getting It Wrong -- What's The Press-Enterprise Been Smoking?

familydocs.orgDr. Tom Bent, president, California Academy of Family PhysiciansRiverside newspaper the Press-Enterprise reported yesterday that "observers don't expect a flood of applicants for medical marijuana cards" even though challenges by San Diego and San Bernardino counties to California ... More >>

Chronic City: Yes, I'm A Medical Marijuana Patient. No, I'm Not Sorry.

Not bad medicine...There are many among us who obviously harbor some enormous moral judgments about marijuana and about those who legally use it as medicine -- as if we should somehow feel guilty about the relief that is afforded us through using this herb.As a legal medical marijuana patient myself ... More >>

Trauma storyline predictions

Good News For Your Prostate: You Can Have Your Omega-3 Fatty Acid And Eat it Too

UCSF researchers have taken this off the prostate blacklistAnyone creating a videogame football roster from scratch knows how it goes: You make him strong, he's going to be slow; you give him speed he's going to be easily tackled; you give him arm strength, he's going to get busted mid-season for a ... More >>

Chronic City: An End To The War On Drugs -- Impossible Dream? Political Ploy? Or Inevitable?

Gil KerlikowskeNew White House Drug Czar and former Seattle police chief Gil Kerlikowske didn't wait long before making big waves as the top drug enforcement officer in the country.  In his first public appearance since being confirmed on May 7, Kerlikowske, in a new interview with the Wall Str ... More >>

Is He Sponge Worthy? Local Company Makes This An Easier Decision.

The real-life discontinuation of the women's contraceptive, the Today Sponge, inspired one of the most memorable episodes of the television show Seinfeld. Upon discovering that her birth control method of choice would soon disappear from stores, the sexually active (and apparently responsible) Elain ... More >>

Chronic City: What If They Banned Zoloft Or Something Else Instead?

igougo.comIf you're a medical marijuana patient, Oceanside may decide on Wednesday that it doesn't want your business. Or your crime, or your noise. Wait, what?Oceanside, like 110 or so other cities in California, may impose a (temporary, they say) ban on medical marijuana dispensaries until the cit ... More >>

Supes Condemn Raid on San Francisco Pot Club, Call For DEA to Mellow Out

Fair enough, it was somewhat lost in the glare of our governor -- once caught on film wearing a shirt emblazoned with the sentence "Arnold Is Numero Uno" while smoking a joint and eating a massive piece of cake -- said he's open to debate on marijuana legalization. But, yesterday, a resolution passe ... More >>

Chronic City: 10 Years For Medical Marijuana -- This Has Got To Stop

HR95.orgBryan EpisWhen Californians voted to legalize medical marijuana under Proposition 215 almost 13 years ago, it's a safe bet that not many of them were expecting such prosecutions would continue well more than a decade later. But that's exactly what is happening, thanks to the Drug Enforcement ... More >>

SF Weekly Letters

Researchers Report Promising Results in Diabetes Stem-cell Treatment -- But Don't Say 'Breakthrough' Yet

Keep those fingers crossedThe front line of advanced biomedical research doesn't stand still. Whether it's promising advances or devastating setbacks, this field of human knowledge is so young -- and so populated by bright and ambitious scientists and entrepreneurs -- that it seems news is always b ... More >>

Stem-cell stalemate: The push for cures may produce only disappointment - or worse

US Attorney Spars with Hastings Law Students Over Pot Laws

The most compelling question from the Hastings panel on pot: How could two guys with such different opinions on marijuana think so similarly about fashion? Was this planned?Hastings law students with the munchies and a keen interest in how changes in federal priorities on marijuana enforce ... More >>

Groovy: Marijuana Advocates Ecstatic About Attorney General's New Pot Policy -- See Boost for Ammiano Legalization Bill

Supporters of legal marijuana -- medical and otherwise -- will be racking their brains to find some way to celebrate a potentially groundbreaking drug policy change announced by Attorney General Eric Holder today.In short, the AG said Justice will only target those "who violate both federal and stat ... More >>

San Francisco Department of Public Health Contained Measles Outbreak, Possibly Saving Lives

Without a measles vaccine, your children's lives may be in danger.Just weeks ago, a San Francisco man who had traveled abroad brought back a deadly souvenier. He had spent some time in Europe with a friend who had been diagnosed with measles, and several days aft ... More >>

Giant, Anthropomorphic Penises All the Rage in San Francisco These Days

San Francisco Department of Public HealthThe Penismobile is a hybrid? We were sure it'd be a Jaguar XKEYou don't always say this about penises, but in San Francisco, they come in threes. First there was the walking, advice-dispensing dong featured in a locally produced health film/soap opera.Then th ... More >>

Walking Penis Highlights Local Doc's Wildly Effective STD Prevention Soap Opera

Coming soon to an STD clinic near you! The San Francisco Department of Public Health is proud to announce that Safe in the City -- a dramatic 23-minute STD prevention video developed by an SFDPH official -- has given the Centers for Disease Control a giant boner. This week, ... More >>

U Wr Gr8 Lst Nite -- BTW, Get Xamined 4 the Syphilis

The etiquette of 21st-century dating is ever-evolving. And, to those who remember the days when safe sex meant remembering to set the parking brake on your Oldsmobile, the notion of an automated, impersonal e-card informing whomever you banged last night that you exposed him or her to syphilis/crabs ... More >>

Clap On! See Where San Francisco Stands in National STD Survey

When in a city beginning with the letter "M," pack your own condoms -- or elseThe results of the Centers for Disease Control's annual survey on whether we've been naughty or nice are in again -- and there's a whole lotta shaking (and itching, burning, and blistering) going on. Educated folks can arg ... More >>

THIRDhand Smoke? Jesus, What Else Can We Regulate?

According to a study appearing in this month's Pediatrics, medical scientists have now identified "thirdhand smoke," which is: a) What you get when the kid of somebody who smokes talks to your kid; b) Only possible through a Facebook widget, or; c) The trace chemicals from smoke that hang aro ... More >>

U.S. Marine Corps an Orgy Palace of Stoned, Drunk, Horny Teens, New UCSF Study Suggests

By Matt SmithWhile doomsayers bemoan America's ongoing wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, researchers at the University of California at San Francisco Medical Center may have turned up a brilliant silver lining.Thanks to desperate recruiting methods required to staff those wars, the U.S. Marines may be t ... More >>

SF Gov. InAction: Quick, the Budget's in Trouble! Someone Cut the Community Justice Center or Something

By Benjamin Wachs Keeping with tradition, the Supervisors have taken a holiday weekend and turned it into an extended vacation. Their justification this time is that they all need the extra two days off to go see "Milk." Last year, it was to stand in line and buy iPhones, and the year before th ... More >>

Sunday Photos: AIDS Walk through Golden Gate Park

No Money In Male Birth Control

Who Can Get Away With Selling Pot Sweets? The Candy Man Can't.

Getting Fat Will Drive You Crazy

Bill Protects Employment Rights of Medical Marijuana Users

Pro-Circumcision AIDS Researcher Left S.F. a Pariah, Came Back a Visionary

U.S. State Department: now with HIV!

MRSA-Killing Fogger Invented by Brits: Bloody Good Job

Medical Marijuana Still Under Fire

Worst E-Card. Ever.: "So, you've been itching, burning, discharging ..."