EJ MONTINI

Montini: Anti-marijuana campaign takes $500K from the maker of deadly narcotic

EJ Montini
opinion columnist


The group leading the opposition to Proposition 205, which would legalize small amounts of marijuana in Arizona, accepted $500,000 from the Chandler-based drug company Insys Therapeutics, which manufactures the deadly painkiller fentanyl, a drug linked to the death of Prince and many, many others.

Imagine that.

The anti-205 group takes half a million in fentanyl cash to fight small amounts of legal marijuana. And these people have the nerve to call themselves Arizonans for Responsible Drug Policy.

ROBERTS:Guess who'll profit if Arizona legalizes pot?

HA!

Insys is being investigated for the way it marketed fentanyl, a drug much stronger than heroin, and which the federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention called a significant "threat to public health and safety.” Miniscule amounts of fentanyl is prescribed to patients for the kind of extreme pain associated with diseases like bone cancer. But law enforcement authorizes are seeing it being abused more and more.

The so-called Arizonans for Responsible Drug Policy were staked to a half million bucks by the people who make this unbelievably deadly stuff. They’ll use that money to convince Arizona voters not to legalize small amounts of marijuana because…it’s too dangerous?

Compared to what?

It's to protect your safety (right)

And what’s in it for the drug company?

In a statement, Insys Therapeutics said it opposes Prop. 205 "because it fails to protect the safety of Arizona’s citizens, and particularly its children."

Again -- HA!

Under the law created by Prop. 205 only individuals over the age of 21 could possess up to an ounce of marijuana.

So, could the drug company’s concern have more to do with the fact that Insys has a profit-making interest in a synthetic version of marijuana's active ingredient, THC?

Drug companies want people to purchase the drugs they create rather than buy a little legal cannabis, particularly since studies show that prescriptions for many types of medications drop where marijuana is legal.

The opposition to Prop. 205 is siding with a drug company over regular people. Taking $500K from such a company. And calling themselves ‘responsible.’

Yeah, right.