A quiet bombshell dropped during the government witness’s testimony at the DEA marijuana rescheduling hearings over the past two days on marijuana and PTSD.
Dr. Dominic Chiapperino testified that to move marijuana out of Schedule I, the FDA needed to find just one condition with a “currently accepted medical use” and that his team ultimately identified only three that met the criteria: pain, anorexia tied to a medical condition, and nausea and vomiting, “usually from chemo.” Of the seven conditions the FDA actually evaluated, he confirmed that only three cleared the bar. The four that did not: PTSD, anxiety, epilepsy, and inflammatory bowel disease.
PTSD stood out. Asked directly whether the FDA had concluded that, for PTSD, the risks of adverse events outweighed the benefit of using marijuana, Chiapperino agreed that it had, even as he acknowledged PTSD is a condition for which many Americans are actively using medical marijuana. He also conceded that for the conditions the FDA chose not to evaluate at all, “nobody should assume” there was evidence to support them.
The FDA’s own recommendation backs him up, and adds color. While outside contractors rated the PTSD evidence as low-to-moderate quality, the FDA’s review “showed mixed results,” concluding that “the potential for psychiatric adverse events associated with treating PTSD with marijuana may be more substantial than any limited benefit.” The evidence base was strikingly thin: of roughly 4,500 studies screened, only a single randomized controlled trial and one observational study survived the FDA’s quality threshold — and that lone trial found marijuana no better than a placebo at reducing PTSD symptoms.
The takeaway is the government’s own: one of the most common reasons people are sold “medical” marijuana is one its scientists refused to endorse.