 Hello. Welcome to the Judge Ben Show. My name is Ben Joseph. I'm a retired Vermont trial judge. This is a program in which I interview people about subjects that come up in law in Vermont. Today my guest is an attorney, Jim Dumont, from Bristol. And he represents Physicians, Family and Friends Education Fund, and has taken a pretty important role in trying to regulate retail sales of marijuana, which are going to start in 2022. This law has been passed by the legislature and it's created something called the Cannabis Control Board. Cannabis is a word that is being used instead of marijuana. I suspect because marijuana is a word with negative connotations, understandably so. So they like to say the people who are pushing this stuff like to call marijuana cannabis. And I can't get around it because it's in the statutes. And this legislation, which is going to create retail sales of marijuana in our state starting next year, has created something called the Cannabis Control Board, or the CCB. And what's your understanding? Is the Cannabis Control Board going to set up the rules under which this stuff can be advertised and sold? Sure. The Cannabis Control Board has three members, a chair and two members appointed by the governor, and they have a huge agenda. They are issuing rules, they're proposing rules to go into effect to govern growing of cannabis products, manufacture or distilling the THC, the cannabis from what's grown, wholesale sales, retail sales, packaging, advertising and licensing of all the people who do all of that. Wow. It's a huge job they have in front of them. Wow. Wow, wow, wow. Well, have you made any proposals to the CCB for how they should approach these tasks? Yes, well, on behalf of the Education Fund, I focused on labeling and advertising. Okay. And let me just say that while my client doesn't agree with everything the CCB is doing, it has to be said they have a huge agenda and they're trying their best. Do they have a staff, these three people? They have a staff, they have counsel, they have staff. And I've sat in some of their meetings. There's a large group of very vocal folks who believe absolutely that marijuana, THC, cannabis, these are good things. And the board has to wade through all of the anecdotes and wade through all the half truths and the wishful thinking and make a decision based on the facts and the law. And it's not easy. So while we don't agree with everything they're proposing, they have a tough job and we recognize that. THC stands for, as I understand it, and I may not pronounce this correctly, tetrahydrokinabinoid. Sounds right to me. Got that right? That's the chemical that is present in marijuana, which causes people to get high for want of a better expression. Do I have that right? Yes. I mean, from my personal perspective, since I went to college in the early 70s, when I got into this and when I was hired to work on this, I thought marijuana, you know, what's the problem with marijuana? Well, it turns out the marijuana that I experienced when I was in high school and when I was in college is a completely different animal than what we've got now because the THC level in it is so much higher. Right. I'm not an expert on it, but I know it's my experience as a college student does not reflect the current reality. So the Education Fund has been particularly concerned. We know it's legal. Each town can vote whether to opt in. Each town and city gets to vote whether to opt in or opt out to allow retail sales. Towns and cities have no right to opt in or opt out if people want to grow or manufacture marijuana or cannabis products that's entirely up to the board. But as far as retail sales, the way the law stands now, a town has to vote yes to allow that to happen or the city has to vote yes. And we know it's going to happen. The focus we have right now is on advertising. The Vermont Medical Society, which is composed of every physician in Vermont. They're not people who are in the pocket of the industry. They're not in the pocket of diehard opponents. They are in the business of protecting their patients in the public. The Vermont Medical Society adopted a resolution in November with very clear warnings they want in all advertising. And we have submitted the Vermont Medical Society's warnings to the CCB and they have not so far agreed to those. So this is the critical issue right now. Well, these warnings would be in all advertisements? Yes. And would they be printed on the packages for the products? That's labeling as distinct from advertising. Oh, okay. And the Vermont Medical Society has proposed the same warning on the packaging and on the advertising. And the CCB is also proposing the same warning on the packaging and on the advertising. But the difference is in what will the warning be? Well, yeah, right. So the CCB has proposed a warning that I counted the words as 138 words. Now, I know there was an ad in Vermont that was very effective where somebody would read the words really, really fast. It may have been cheese treat or I can't remember what it was. But it was very funny. But you couldn't really tell what he was saying. You would have to read the CCB's warning really, really fast for people not to just turn it off or stop listening. Because it's 138 words. The Vermont Medical Society has a 38 word warning, which I will read to you right now. Please. It's very distinct. Okay. And it's clear and you'll remember it. And this is how it goes. Warning. Cannabis THC may cause one, psychosis. Two, impaired driving. Three, addiction. Four, suicide attempt. Five, uncontrollable vomiting. Six, harm to fetus or nursing baby. And note that the psychosis and the suicide attempts can occur in individuals with no previous history of psychosis or mental illness. End of warning. End of ad. And if I were to read to you now the 138th version, all your listeners would go get a coffee. I'm sorry. I'm time limited. Yes. Right. So every one of these six parts is based on peer reviewed medical literature. Right. I can tell you so far this year 16 people have been killed in auto accidents caused by people driving under the influence of marijuana. In Vermont. In Vermont. Wow. Last year it was 12. The number goes up and down. But for the last six years there's always been a certain number of people killed in the highways. It's a serious ongoing problem. So I thought it might be useful to share with your audience what I learned when I was working on this, which is I had no idea that there was such a thing as uncontrollable vomiting. I had never heard of it. Well, you're the lawyer and the doctor's next. The doctor's next. But one of the things I saw was this video that describes the uncontrolled vomiting. And I'm focusing on that today because the public has no idea what the effects of the current product are. And this is an example that 99.99% of the public has no idea is associated with high levels of THC that's now in this product. Well, and it's also, as you pointed out before, the products that are being pushed now, not what they were when you were a kid in the 70s. These are much different things. Right. With high concentrations of THC, like candy, like gummies that are being sold. And I'm sure there are going to be children who are damaged by this stuff. So on that point, the CCB has been clear about having really strict controls on what is marketed to children. However, the problem is once it's out there, a 21-year-old buys the gummies with a high level of cannabis or THC in it. Right. How is that going to be enforced so that the 20-year-old doesn't give it to the 14-year-old or the 10-year-old? Yeah. So that's why advertising is so important to get their message out to everybody, even person who may not be the purchaser. Right. It could be the parents at home or it could be the friend who says, you know what I heard on the radio, this is dangerous for kids. Maybe I shouldn't take it even though I didn't buy it myself. The kids may see the advertising and say, well, maybe I shouldn't take it. Right. Well, that's one of the reasons we're doing this show today. Right. So you want to see a video on uncontrollable vomiting, which none of us would have expected from smoking marijuana. Hopefully I can do this. Here we go. Doctors are seeing an increase in a violent illness. Doctors there are staying vigilant of potential marijuana-related health problems. Doctors are finding some cases where the drug itself is actually making people sick. These patients really have been experiencing this cannabinoid hyperemesis syndrome. This is something that's caused by chronic marijuana use. CHS has only been recognized for about the past decade and nobody knows exactly how many people suffer from it. There's concern that we will see more and more cases of CHS. What did you feel better? Good morning, I'm really just in bed, okay? Five straight days of just throwing up every day, not being able to eat. Man, I couldn't keep a drop of water there. I was completely convinced that I was gonna die. I was fighting just to stay in this world. This is a problem and people don't know. I didn't know it was possible that it would mess up your stomach to that extent. Every single person I've told what this is was blown away. It had no clue that it existed. I couldn't travel. I couldn't go to work. I couldn't hang out with my friends. I couldn't eat food that I liked. It ruins everything. For people who experienced it, it's extremely disturbing and debilitating and may be more common than we imagine. Eat is the one thing that makes you feel better. I was probably eight hours per day. Yeah, probably. Do 20 showers a day. The water's so hot that it's scalding them. Severely burned to my back from all the shattering I was doing. I was just cutting myself. I was so desperate for relief. It is literally so much better than the pain that's in my stomach to a point where I'd rather burn myself than deal with the pain that I have. I've never been in so much pain in my life. I missed an entire year of work. I was so deeply in denial I never even Googled the symptoms of cannabis hyperemesis syndrome. People with CHS are suffering for years with symptoms and are having multiple hospitalizations and hundreds of thousand dollars of medical bills. Close to 20 years that I suffered without having any knowledge of CHS at all. You tell people what you have and they don't believe it. Nobody believes it. Nobody believes it. They just can't understand it. It's got to be something else. I just couldn't believe it. It's like, Mom, I just don't understand. They always told us Papa's harmless. I had all kinds of tests. They removed my appendix. If anything, they said that the smoking of the cannabis would help. That's just not true. You know, marijuana is completely benign. Nobody has died from marijuana. Well, I thought that's not true either. In his final hospitalization, he had not eaten for more than 50 days. I kept saying to them, listen, I don't think this kid's gonna make it. People got asked from this. Nobody's taking it seriously. This is about a 17-year-old child who lost his life over something that could have easily been prevented. My education. I was not able to save him. But I'm gonna make sure that his story is out there and some people are helped. Plus, I can pretty much be educated on it. You know, there's people in the medical industry and in the marijuana industry who are potentially giving out advice to try and deal with this problem that could lead to somebody dying. I thought transparency was part of the promise of legalized pot. And no one has been transparent. We are not trying to demonize marijuana. It is a wonder. It just needs to be used correctly, not abused. We have no research. We don't know anything about it, really, because we've never studied it. I think it's very important that we get research done so that way more people don't get sick. Those kinds of testimonies, I think, are more important than what you and I could say. You know, the people who have actually been through this stuff. This is really something. Do you think that this legalization and the advertising and all this is gonna lead to increased use of the drug? Well, I'm just a dumb lawyer. I'm not a social scientist. But I don't think people would be spending money on advertising if they thought it was a waste of money. So the point here is that the advertising is going to be allowed. Right. And that's the question. Should we allow advertising? Do you think it should be allowed? Well, the legislature has already made that decision that it should be allowed. The statute says it's allowed. Let's regulate it. So we're here. The statute is specific as to how the advertising should be done, isn't it? It's not very... Well, in some ways, yes. For example, it says you can't advertise to an audience that's intentionally of minors. Well, that's a step in the right direction. It's clear, though, to me as a lawyer looking at this, that the legislature said to the CCB regulate advertising. So CCB would be in dealing with another legal issue if they said we're not gonna allow it at all. So if it's gonna happen, let's regulate it with regulation that is effective. Okay. Okay. And I remember you wrote something about the legislation says there shall be warnings, right? Yes. It's not up to the CCB. That decision has already been made that the warnings will be there. Yes. The decision has been made. There shall be warnings on packaging. Okay. And there shall be warnings in advertising. The question is, what will the warnings be? Well, yeah. You know. Okay. Well, the warning about psychosis. Why is there a warning about psychosis? This is something else I learned that I had. No idea that people can have psychotic breaks. In other words, they're in a different world. They're not, as you know as a retired judge, people who have psychosis legally aren't even responsible for their actions. Yeah. If you believe that Saturn is telling you what to do and you're just doing what Saturn tells you, you're not legally responsible for your actions. That is psychosis, a psychotic break from reality. And people do terrible things or horrible things, sometimes wonderful things when they're, you know, depends on the day. But people without any history of psychosis, particularly with higher levels of THC in the product, according to the peer-reviewed medical literature, are experiencing psychosis that is attributed to the marijuana product. And some of them are, I gather, well, I know have become addicted to the use of this stuff. Is that right? Yes. And I think this is probably, I'm not the expert on this, but it appears that this is a result of the marijuana having much higher potency than the stuff from the 60s and the 70s that you or I grew up with. We won't ask you what you did because you're a retired judge. No, no, I'm not, I grew up in the 60s. And it was illegal. And I was going to be an attorney. And I thought, no, I'm not going near that stuff. So I've never experimented with this, never, never. Well, on that score, you did go to college. I certainly did. And you must have had roommates. Yeah, well, yes. Yeah, yeah, yeah. In my college environment, if you're going to breathe, you had to inhale marijuana smoke because it was everywhere. My roommates were all athletes as I was and none of them ever smoked marijuana. Wow. I've never heard of that. Well, I was a wrestler at Penn and I was conditioning all year round. And I thought it's stupid. I mean, I just thought it was stupid. You know, it's like, you know, one of the things that has really impressed me recently, I'm seeing ads on television for alcohol. Have you seen this ad yet? It's a young, young man walking down the street carrying like a bag with crown royal whiskey. And he goes down the street and he's doing nice things for other people. He's helping a kid. He's carrying a bag for somebody else. And then he gets, apparently he gets to his home and he goes up and he holds up this whiskey and he's making a gift to it to his mother. And then the two of them are drinking. You know, and I think to myself, wow. So then now there's a kind of going to be a competition between alcohol and marijuana. The cannabis guys are going to be trying to capture some of the alcohol drinkers and have them using this stuff. It'll be THC instead of alcohol. Go, it's sick. And that gets to the heart of it. I was thinking about this as I drove up here this morning. If you asked most people you met on the street, they would say we know that if you drink too much alcohol you're going to have a problem. You may become an alcoholic. You may be driving in a dangerous way. You're not going to work. Everybody knows that about alcohol. People don't understand that marijuana also has to be used carefully. As with alcohol, maybe more so. It's not danger-free. And that's the problem. People think it's completely harmless. And it's not. Well, you see, I don't really have... My social circle doesn't involve anybody who's smoking marijuana. I mean, there are some people I know who... I don't drink any alcohol. My wife passed away eight years ago and I thought I'm the last grandparent and I'm trying to monitor my health. So I don't drink that stuff. And frankly, I don't miss it. I think that it's something that requires self-discipline. And I think addiction is a chronic problem with marijuana, from what I can see. That there are people who are... They have what do they call it? Cannabis-induced psychosis, CIP. You know, I see that in some of the literature I read. And I just think the social cost of promoting this stuff and selling it, you know, alcohol kills more than 10,000 people a year in the United States in traffic accidents alone. And then there are all these other health problems that flow from it. And to promote the use of another drug that has these terrible consequences, it's just... I think it was a bad decision, but I think people like yourself and the organizations you represent got to do what you can to control the harm. This is really... This is a big moment. So let's talk about where the public can have a say right now. The CCB is in the process of issuing rules. Those rules get filed with the Secretary of State. And then the rules are put on the CCB's website. And then they have a public comment period. And then if 25 or more people ask for hearing, then they have to have a public hearing. And the rules don't become final until after that whole process, that process is done. And then it goes to a committee of the legislature, legislative committee on administrative rules, LCAR, and the rule still isn't final until they look at it and they take a vote on it. And after they take a vote on it, this is true of all rulemaking in Vermont. After they take a vote on it, if they issue a vote that says, we're not happy with the rule and we don't accept it. The rule can still go into effect, but if it's challenged in court, instead of the challenger having to prove that the rule is unlawful, if the legislative committee voted against it, then the agency has to prove in court that the rule is lawful. So it makes a difference. So if people have concerns, for example, about the advertising rule, and we want a warning that people actually listen to and learn from, they should write the CCB during the common period or before they should write their legislator and it may be the CCB will come up with a better rule. I know they're listening. They're trying to do the right thing. So how do you know that? Because I've watched their meetings. It's clear. They're not in anybody's pocket. They're not in my client's pocket. They're not in the industry's pocket. They've got a tough job. They're primarily hearing from the advocates. The legalization advocates, they've had success in the legislature, which is fine. And now they are... I've got to say, I don't think it's fine, but it's a fact. It is a fact, right? We've got to live with it. And if you watch these hearings, the meetings of the CCB, they're flashing you. We've only got five more minutes. All right. So the people who come to these meetings are advocates. Right. And the CCB needs to hear from everybody else. Okay. Okay. How do they communicate? They have a public comment portal on their website. Okay. So you can go to the Vermont Cannabis Control Board. You can Google it. They'll show up at their website. And if you click the right place, there's a comment portal. Okay. You can submit comments. All right. Or you could... That's the best way. Just go to their comment portal. Mm-hmm. And... You know, I've been derelicting this. Is there a phone number that people can call into? That probably is, but I'm not sure. Yeah. But in this day and age, I think filing a comment online is the most effective way. Mm-hmm. And the comment could say, we want a warning that reflects what our doctors have told us is necessary. Mm-hmm. The Vermont Medical Society said, we need to tell people these six problems. Mm-hmm. Keep it short and sweet. But it has to be these six problems, most of which the public has no idea of. That's the thing that concerns me. So the people who are not using this stuff have no notion as to what the consequences can be. And if there's advertising, and there are going to be new users, this is going to cause an awful lot of grief, to say it. Well, we kind of run out of time. You know, I want to thank you very much. Thank you. Thank you. Thanks for having me. I've been vaccinated. Okay. Thank you for looking in. This has been a terrific moment, I think. I hope you've enjoyed it. I hope you'll communicate with the Learn About Sam email address that has been put on the screen and do what you can to educate yourself about what's going on here. It's going to have consequences for a lot of people. The 16 people who have been killed so far this year by marijuana influence driving, I'm afraid that number is only going to go up from here. Thank you for looking in. Hope to see you next time. Bye-bye.