Monthly Archives: February 2012 - Part 2

Opinion: Affordable Care Act saving seniors money, closing ‘donut hole’

By Bob Semro Prescription drugs are a big part of the monthly budget for many seniors on Medicare, and provisions in the Affordable Care Act (ACA) are working to lower those costs. In 2011, 3.6 million Medicare recipients nationwide saved $2.1 billion in prescription drug costs, according to estimates released last week by the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS). In Colorado, 39,746 Medicare recipients saved $22.8 million on prescription drugs, or $579 per person on average, according to these estimates. HHS projects these savings will increase over time totaling nearly $4,200 for the average Medicare recipient by 2020….

Under Siege Video

Search drug incidents at your school. Search tips and data notes

Colorado schools have reported a 45 percent spike in drug violations in the past four years, even as the total number of other violations reported to state officials has declined. Interviews with school officials, health care workers and students across the state depict marijuana as the key factor behind the increase. Whats happening at your school? Search below to see a four-year history of drug offenses and their disposition, such as expulsion. Click here to load this Caspio Online Database. Search tips and data notes To compare schools or districts, hit Ctrl or command and click on as many names…

MMJ locations in relation to schools

Teen marijuana use spikes along with expulsions, arrests

By Katie Kerwin McCrimmon of Solutions and Nancy Mitchell of Education News Colorado A handful of students from Denvers East High School recently spent a warm January lunch period huddled against a brick home two blocks from the school, passing a joint and discussing the merits of medical marijuana. It smells better than what you get on the street, they say, and is more potent. The buds are whole, not ground up like oregano. I get top shelf, boasts a 16-year-old boy. My cousin works at a dispensary. So he brings maybe two zips (plastic bags) a day that theyre…

Opinion: Medical marijuana industry welcomes regulation

By Michael Elliott and Norton Arbelaez Staff Sergeant Mary McNeely joined the military, went to Iraq and served her country with honor. While there, she was injured in a car bombing. Upon returning to Colorado Springs, physicians at the Veterans Administration prescribed her narcotic pain medications to treat her various injuries. Nonetheless, her health kept deteriorating. The drugs did not effectively treat her pain, made her irritable, nauseous and unable to function. She grew distant from her daughter and husband. Through Colorados medical marijuana system, she discovered that cannabis controlled her pain and nausea with minimal side-effects. As a result,…

Opinion: Medical marijuana a threat to Colorado’s children

By John Suthers Eleven years ago the citizens of Colorado passed an amendment to the Colorado Constitution called Amendment 20. The amendment simply created an affirmative defense against the enforcement of state marijuana laws for people with debilitating medical conditions who have physician approval to use the drug. But in recent years, a series of policy decision at the state and federal levels have opened the door to the creation of a medical marijuana industry in Colorado. We have gone, over the course of a half decade, from a state that had roughly 1,700 medical marijuana patients and a system…

Freshman faced felonies after school marijuana bust

By Katie Kerwin McCrimmon The call came last fall while the young single dad was at his construction job. It was the hardest day of my life, he said. The mans son, an East High School freshman, had been busted with baggies of marijuana at a Colfax Avenue parking garage adjacent to the school. His arrest was one of 18 at East for marijuana possession last year and among the 179 arrests for marijuana possession or sale at 43 Denver schools during 2010-11, according to Denver police records. The boy said he purchased the marijuana from a senior at school….

Senate committee votes to restore Medicaid funds for circumcision

By Diane Carman Despite the spirited testimony of seven opponents to routine circumcision, the Senate Health and Human Services Committee Thursday voted 6 to 3 to restore Medicaid funding for the procedure. A change in the long bill, the budget document developed by the Joint Budget Committee, dropped funding for the procedure last year, making Colorado one of 18 states to defund circumcision under Medicaid. Senate Bill 90, introduced by Sen. Joyce Foster, D-Denver, would restore the funding, estimated at $186,500 annually. Foster told the committee that the bill was about disease prevention, fairness and social justice. More important, she…