Friday, March 30, 2012

Senator Rand Paul of Kentucky is the lone holdout preventing a vote on synthetic marijuana legislation in the US Senate through a procedural block that is allowed under the rules. Until Paul lifts his block, the Senate will not be able to act on legislation that has already passed the US House of Representatives last December. Wikinews has investigated the block on the legislation.

Synthetic marijuana can be sold over the counter in some places and it is commonly known by brand names, such as “K2” or “Spice”. Other types of synthetic “designer” drugs, like “bath salts”, belong to a class of substances that are in some cases legal, though they create a health hazard, because they are declared not meant for human consumption.

At issue in the legislation is the amount of chemical substances banned, the criminalization of substances, the authority of the federal versus the state government to makes those decisions, the extent to which the product is a threat or hazard to public health and safety, and the effect such a law would have on the research of these substances. All of these issues were debated in the House. Paul has made an issue of the long prison sentences for marijuana. His critics claim he is going too far by blocking legislation. Paul, a Republican who has libertarian leanings, has argued that the states should have the authority to ban drugs.

According to the National Conference of State Legislatures, 31 states have a ban on both synthetic cannabinoids and substituted cathinones while 39 states have a ban on synthetic cannabinoids. Rand’s home state of Kentucky bans both. But legislation is not a perfect solution; in Cass County, Michigan, four teenagers between the ages of 13 and 14 had an emergency after using synthetic marijuana, but even though Michigan bans both, police are not sure that the substances are illegal. Chemists have to conduct tests on the products.

Although Paul is framing the issue as a legal one, the medical community has turned its attention to this new phenomenon’s impact on public health and safety. In an article that appeared in the March 2012 issue of Pediatriacs, medical researchers led by Dr. Joanna Cohen analyzed the cases of three teens who were hospitalized and treated as emergencies after an incident of synthetic marijuana use. One 16-year-old girl lost her motor skills and was unresponsive yet she had an exceptionally high heart rate and abnormal blood pressure. An 18-year-old boy was extremely sweaty, had a high heart rate and was agitated. And a 16-year-old boy had a speech dysfunction, as well as symptoms of agitation and confusion. The doctors who wrote the study say people are using this product because they believe it can give them a high similar to marijuana, however, the new drug can bring on both psychological symptoms, like psychosis and paranoia, and physical ones, such as convulsions.

One out of every nine high school students has reported use of synthetic marijuana, according to Monitoring the Future released in December 2011. The annual survey can be used to spot new trends in substance use among youth and the report included synthetic marijuana for the first time in 2011.

Poison centers noticed a sharp increase in calls reporting incidents due to synthetic marijuana. According to the American Association of Poison Control Centers, in 2010 centers nationwide took 2,906 calls for synthetic marijuana cases, but by 2011, they took 6,959 calls. The problem is noticeable to local health officials, like in Syracuse, New York, which is Senator Chuck Schumer’s state, where 120 cases were reported and one health professional called it “a significant public health concern.” New York has a ban on substituted cathinones but not synthetic canabanoids, according to the National Conference of State Legislatures.

Although the US Drug Enforcement Agency placed five substances that fall under synthetic marijuana into Schedule I on March 1, 2011, its emergency powers only last one and a half years and its ban has not stopped other substances from being used instead. Schedule I is a running list of banned chemicals.

Three of Paul’s Senate senior colleagues say Paul should drop his block. Senators Chuck Grassley, Chuck Schumer, and Amy Klobuchar are sponsoring bipartisan legislation that aims to ban synthetic marijuana as a serious health threat. The legislation is bipartisan as Grassley is a Republican , while both Schumer and Klobuchar are Democrats. Senator Schumer, in an editorial for the New York Daily News, advocated tackling synthetic marijuana at the national level rather than at the state. Schumer’s argument is that states have tried to ban the ingredients commonly found these products but the manufacturers have the flexibility to alter the ingredients to bypass the law. Schumer said the federal government needs a proactive rather than a reactive stance against drugs. “All we need is one senator, Rand Paul of Kentucky, to release his block on this legislation,” wrote Schumer. “We’re urging him to do the right thing, and let us move forward with a vote.”

Before the Senate took up the issue, similar legislation had already passed in the House. The House voted 317–98 in favor of the Synthetic Drug Control Act of 2011 on December 8, 2011. Pennsylvania Congressperson Charles Dent sponsored the legislation that would add ingredients found in synthetic marijuana to Schedule I. Dent’s legislation included chemicals that are not even found in the United States at this time, but he argues that synthetic marijuana is too great of a public health threat to dismiss.

Standing in opposition to the legislation, Virginia Congressperson Bobby Scott and several fellow Democrats argued Dent’s legislation was bypassing a process for the banning of drugs that was already in place and established. Scott also argued some of the substances banned by the legislation were not even present in the United States but so far only in Europe. His colleagues argued researchers would lose the ability to conduct research freely on these substances and, as Scott noted, the legislation was seeking to ban substances but without any research to back it up.

Grassley’s legislation is named for David Rozga, an Iowan who committed suicide after using synthetic marijuana. In his speech, before the Senate, Grassley said Rozga’s situation inspired him to put forward the legislation.

For some families, the issue has also become an emotional one, as they have lost a loved one. Karen Dobner, a mother from Aurora, Illinois, is blaming Senator Paul for any deaths that may still occur because he is holding up a legislative solution to a problem that she says killed her own son. When her son Max was in college, he tried a synthetic marijuana product and had a panic attack. Dobner believes the car crash that killed her son would not have happened had he not been experiencing the symptoms of the designer drug. Now Dobner keeps calling Paul’s office begging him to stop his hold.

Senator Paul’s office was contacted by both phone and email about this report but it did not respond.

Monday, December 31, 2007

What would you tell your grandchildren about 2007 if they asked you about it in, let’s say, 20 year’s time? If the answer to a quiz question was 2007, what would the question be? The year that you first signed on to Facebook? The year Britney Spears and Amy Winehouse fell apart? The year author Kurt Vonnegut or mime Marcel Marceau died, both at 84?

Let’s take a look at some of the international stories of 2007. Links to the original Wikinews articles are in bold.

Wednesday, December 19, 2012

Recently, Wikinews spent time with with Chilean Paralympic skier Jorge Migueles who was in Copper Mountain, Colorado for the IPC Nor-Am Cup.

((Wikinews)) I’m interviewing Jorge Migueles, he is here from Chile. And you’re from Santiago.

Jorge Migueles: Yes, from Santiago.

((WN)) What you’re what classification?

Jorge Migueles: LW4, I have a prosthetic I ski with, special for skiing, I have an amputation below the knee.

((WN)) When people think of skiing, they don’t automatically think Chile as a great place for skiers, and developing skiers. How did the skier [Jorge Migueles] from Chile become a skier?

Jorge Migueles: Yes it is a good place because all the big teams — USA, Austria, Canada — go for training there and they go […] in September because the snow is very hard for training, very icy, and it is very close to Santiago, to the airport, it is more easy for the logistics for the team.

((WN)) I take it that you really like skiing?

Jorge Migueles: Yeah.

((WN)) Do you do any other sports?

Jorge Migueles: Yes, I competed in triathlon, but only for a hobby. I got training in Santiago before to come here, to ski[?] here and one, two months in Europe.

((WN)) So the triathlon helps you with your skiing?

Jorge Migueles: Yeah.

((WN)) I take it your taking to go to Sochi?

Jorge Migueles: Yeah, I try.

((WN)) Has your country [Chile] won any Paralympic medals in the winter games?

Jorge Migueles: No, never, neither[?] olympic nor paralympic.

((WN)) So you want to be the first winter Paralympian medal from your country?

Jorge Migueles: I try that. Very difficult.

((WN)) Do you get government support for the winter Paralympic side?

Jorge Migueles: Not yet, but I try and get support from the government because in Chile all the sport in the summer in Santiago 2014 is all the sport in the summer is all they reimburse[?], the monies go there, in the winter it’s more difficult. But I try that.

((WN)) Is winter sport popular in Chile?

Jorge Migueles: Yeah, it’s popular, but it’s very expensive to practice skiing or snowboard.

((WN)) The only other major news story that people know about in Chile is the earthquake, that didn’t impact you that much you at all?

Jorge Migueles: Yes, a lot, because when […] had to stay here in United States training, and seeing in the news the earthquake, was very hard.

((WN)) And your family and everything was okay, with that?

Jorge Migueles: Yes, they’re okay.

((WN)) Is there anything people who know nothing about Paralympic sport in Chile should know?

Jorge Migueles: In London, in the past Olympic Game, one person with disability […], he won gold medal in London. […] He was the first Paralympic to win a medal in the history of Chile. And now the people know this movement [The Paralympics].

((WN)) That’s very cool. Okay. Thank you very, very much.

Jorge Migueles: Thank you.

Monday, June 5, 2006

Australian media reports that Prime Minister John Howard is expected to push a nuclear energy inquiry through federal cabinet this week. Meanwhile, a list of possible sites for nuclear reactors has been leaked by the Opposition to media. The locations, listed in 1997, include Adelaide, Darwin, Perth, Lucas Heights, Goulburn, Holsworthy, and Broken Hill in New South Wales and other sites.

West Australian (WA) premier Alan Carpenter says the list of fourteen potential sites were a “facade to soften up Western Australians into accepting a nuclear waste dump.” The WA Premier said people would not only be surprised but “stunned to learn that the federal cabinet considered possible sites… without disclosing them to any state government.”

Mr Carpenter said in a media release that the document mentions a site near Perth airport. “People should wake up to what’s happening around Australia, particularly in WA,” said Mr. Carpenter. “Only a few weeks ago, we had three prominent WA Liberal MPs supporting a nuclear waste dump in WA,” he said. “This is all a facade in the Howard Government’s push to soften up West Australians for a nuclear waste dump.”

Premier Carpenter, whose Labor government stridently opposes uranium mining in WA, stated his opposition to a nuclear waste dump: “I vehemently oppose the prospect of our State becoming the dumping ground for the world’s nuclear waste and that is what will happen if we allow uranium mining in WA. The evidence is mounting and indisputable.”

The South Australian Government has ruled out any possible nuclear power plant in SA. “A nuclear power plant would bankrupt our state,” SA Premier Mike Rann said. “It would not be commercially viable and would not, in my view, be acceptable to the public. Nuclear power plants need giant populations to sustain them, there is no-one coming to me from the commercial sector or the mining industry or anywhere else, suggesting a nuclear power plant.”

Earlier, Foreign Affairs Minister Alexander Downer said South Australia should build a nuclear power station to run a desalination plant. Premier Rann dismissed the idea as ridiculous and said comments by Mr Downer highlight divisions within Federal Cabinet. He said Mr Downer is at odds with the Federal Finance Minister Nick Minchin, who says the high costs of nuclear power would rule it out.

Mr Rann says South Australia will not allow nuclear power. “For once I’m agreeing with Nick Minchin,” he said. “I think Nick Minchin is right that a nuclear power plant isn’t necessary and won’t happen and I think that Alexander Downer is having a bit of a lend of him.”

Victoria’s Energy Minister Theo Theophanous said nuclear energy in Australia did not make sense when the cost and problems of waste disposal were considered. Mr Theophanous has rejected a report that found nuclear power could be competitive with conventional energy generation if it was subsided with help from a taxpayer subsidy.

A recent report found nuclear power could compete with gas or coal-fired electricity if taxpayers helped to pay for it or shouldered the risk of its production. The ANSTO report found nuclear plants could be built in the next 10 to 15 years and an Australian version would cost about $2.5 billion to establish. To make it viable, taxpayers would pay hundreds of million towards start-up costs, said the report.

But Mr Theophanous said Victoria had already had concluded the nuclear proposal did not add up. “I had my department look at this and provide a report to me more than a year ago in relation to the prospect of nuclear power,” he said. “The problem is a commercial one as much as anything else. It costs roughly double the price to produce power out of nuclear energy. If you’re going to pay double the price, why not put in wind farms? Why not use renewable energy, which is even cheaper than nuclear energy?” said Mr Theophanous .

The Victoria Government urges householders to reduce greenhouse emissions by reducing daily energy consumption. A new campaign identifies simple measures residents can adopt to cut power bills and greenhouse emissions, including turning the heating thermostat to no more than 20C, washing clothes in cold water and turning appliances off at the switch when they are not being used.

New South Wales Premier Morris Iemma has also declared his opposition to nuclear power. He said no nuclear power stations would be built in NSW as long as he is premier. Mr Iemma urged state opposition leader Peter Debnam to join him in opposing the construction of nuclear power plants in NSW. “While ever I’m premier of NSW there won’t be any nuclear power plants in NSW,” he told reporters.

Queensland Premier Peter Beattie says he “would not jeopardize the state’s coal industry by supporting a nuclear power plant.” Mr. Beattie has ruled out uranium mining in Queensland to protect the state’s huge coal industry. He said he would not support a nuclear power plant. “The State Government would not support it,” Mr. Beattie said.

“We have the power to block them and we would block them, we would not support nuclear power. Why would we have a nuclear reactor in competition with the coal industry?” Mr. Beattie told media.