"Health & Medical News"

Better vigilance is needed to ensure medical research on human subjects is not flawed by financial conflicts of interest, according to the Assn. of American Medical Colleges and the Assn. of American Universities.

In March, the two organizations issued a report that calls on medical schools and research universities to put into place conflict-of-interest policies within two years. Such policies should cover how to identify, evaluate and manage financial conflicts, the report said.

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A Colorado judge ruled last year that police illegally seized 39 medical-marijuana plants from a Fort Collins couple, who are now in court seeking reimbursement for the value of the plants.

The Denver Channel reported Jan. 17 that James and Lisa Masters said that after a county judge dismissed all criminal charges against them and ordered the police to return the plants, they received the crop back dry, brittle and moldy. The Drug Enforcement Administration estimated that each plant was worth roughly $1,000.

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Suspected drunk-drivers are being quizzed by New Jersey police about where they had their last drink as part of an effort to identify bars that may be habitually overserving customers, the New York Times reported Dec. 30.

The “last drink” initiative, instituted by the state Division of Alcoholic Beverage Control, gathers information from police officers in a statewide database; regulators then use the information to better target investigations by state alcohol inspectors.

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A plan to cut back on the broad swaths of some cities covered by Drug-Free School Zones in New Jersey is meeting some resistance from police, the Home News Tribune reported Dec. 17.

Currently, the law calls for harsher penalties for drug offenses that take place within 1,000 feet of a school or 500 feet of a park. But in some urban areas, overlapping zones effectively mean that offenders face increased punishment no matter where in town their offenses occur.

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Hershey’s Ice Breakers Pacs — dissolvable pouches filled with mint-flavored powder — are being criticized by some law-enforcement officials who say the packaging resembles pouches of illicit cocaine and heroin, the Associated Press reported Nov. 30.

“Being in narcotics the majority of my career, I thought it was the real stuff,” said Philadelphia Police Chief Inspector William Blackburn of the nickel-sized mints.

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California’s Fourth District Court of Appeal has ruled that police need to return marijuana seized from medical users if drug charges against them have been dropped, the San Francisco Chronicle? reported Nov. 30.

Police, prosecutors and local governments had argued that it would condone drug use, interfere with federal law enforcement, and possible expose police to prosecution on drug charges if they were forced to return seized marijuana. But the court cited California’s medical-marijuana law in ordering that seized marijuana be returned to its rightful owners.

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Police in Missouri and Arizona are field-testing a new handheld device that the manufacturer claims can detect traces of methamphetamine on clothing, skin, and other surfaces, USA Today reported Nov. 5.

The device, made by CDEX of Tucson, Ariz., uses ultraviolet light to detect traces of the drug as small as one microgram, according to CEO Malcolm Philips. The scanner can distinguish between illegal meth and pseudoephedrine, a chemically similar but legal component of cold medications.

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Voters in Denver appear to have approved a ballot question that would require police to make enforcement of marijuana-possession laws their lowest priority, the Rocky Mountain News reported Nov. 7.

Question 100, backed by the group Safe Alternatives for Enjoyable Recreation (SAFER), was being approved by a 5-to-4 margin, election observers said, although balloting was incomplete.

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The U.S. Justice Department reported that more than 2,000 people died in police custody between 2003 and 2005, and that 13 percent of the deaths were related to alcohol or other drug intoxication.

Reuters reported Oct. 11 that alcohol and other drug intoxication was the second-leading cause of deaths in policy custody, trailing only “homicides by state and local law-enforcement officers,” which accounted for 55 percent of deaths. Suicides accounted for 12 percent.

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