A Hope Township mother cautiously praised Gov. Chris Christie's conditional approval today of a bill that would allow chronically ill children access to specialized medical marijuana.
A Hope Township mother cautiously praised Gov. Chris Christie's conditional approval today of a bill that would allow chronically ill children access to specialized medical marijuana.
Christie agreed to allow children exclusive access to ingestible forms of pot at state-approved dispensaries and to allow dispensaries to grow more than three strains of the drug. He vetoed a portion of the bill that would allow one doctor to prescribe the drug instead of the two to three currently needed. The bill now heads back to the state Legislature for final approval.
"Today, I am making commonsense recommendations to this legislation to ensure sick children receive the treatment their parents prefer, while maintaining appropriate safeguards," Christie said in a statement.
For Jennie Stormes, Christie's decision is a mixed victory. The Warren County resident has lobbied for the bill's full passage on behalf of her 14-year-old son, Jackson Stormes, who suffers from Dravet syndrome, a rare and sometimes deadly form of epilepsy.
The 50 or so pharmaceutical drugs the family has tried have done little to ease his seizures, but medical marijuana strains from California, where Jackson's father lives, have helped, she said.
Under the bill, the state can now grow a form of medical marijuana that is high in a compound known as CBD and low in THC, the chemical that gets pot users high. Stormes and other parents have said the form with high CBD is beneficial to children suffering from Dravet syndrome.
"We can now grow medication for our children," Jennie Stormes said of New Jersey, under Christie's decision.
Stormes said she was still disappointed the governor did not simplify access to medical marijuana. The state requires a psychiatrist and pediatrician to sign off on the medication for children and possibly a third doctor if one of them is not registered in the state's cannabis program.
Getting a child before that many doctors can be expensive for families, and it would likely mean getting a prescription from a doctor who is not as familiar with the patient. A child's regular doctor, such as an oncologist or neurologist, should have that authority on his or her own, she said.
"The problem with it is the doctors are fragmented," she said. "I would have liked to have seen him add in one doctor, one who is a specialist."
Jackson has already received the prescriptions he needed to get medical marijuana, but New Jersey's dispensaries have been overwhelmed by demand. Stormes guessed it would be another three months before Jackson receives his supply.
"There's been a lot of benefits, a tremendous amount of benefits," she said.
The Associated Press contributed to this report.