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From Tipping Point to Breaking Point: Shaping Federal Cannabis/Cannabinoid Policy Under Fire
Unpack developments and trends from this Congressional session, learn how the election will impact cannabis/cannabinoid policy, and learn the critical need for physicians and health experts to be visible on Capitol Hill to ensure policy changes pave the way for an expanded definition of medicine rather than cementing a new chapter in prohibition.
Meet the Speaker:
Steph Sherer- Founder, Board President, and Executive Director, Americans for Safe Access Now
Steph Sherer is the foremost international leader and expert on medical cannabis patient advocacy. Her direct experiences with the medical benefits of cannabis and political organizing led Sherer to form Americans for Safe Access (ASA) in 2002, with the purpose of building a strong movement to protect patients and their rights and transform US policy to allow for the recognition of cannabis as medicine. Today, ASA is the largest national patient-centric organization of medical cannabis, wellness, and healthcare stakeholders, addressing knowledge, policy, and regulatory gaps to ensure access to cannabis for therapeutic use and research.
Sherer is a powerful advocate, a skilled spokesperson, and an energetic initiator of campaigns. For over two decades, Sherer’s leadership has guided efforts with lawmakers across the country to adopt and improve medical cannabis legislation and brought patients’ voices to Capitol Hill. She has trained over 100,000 individuals nationwide on civic engagement, building a powerful grassroots movement for medical cannabis. Alongside the American Herbal Products Association (AHPA) and the American Herbal Pharmacopoeia, she led efforts to produce the first product safety standards for cannabis Distribution, Cultivation, Analytics, Manufacturing, Packaging, and Labeling.
Sherer is a powerful advocate, a skilled spokesperson, and an energetic initiator of strategic campaigns. For over two decades, she has pursued ASA’s vision by articulating the immediate needs of patients and incorporating strategies across many disciplines to break down political, social, academic, and legal barriers and clear the way for a national medical cannabis program and a pathway for the federal recognition of botanical cannabis medicines.
Sherer has devoted her career to disrupting policies perpetuating health inequalities and investing in innovative solutions to close the divide between wellness and medicine. Under her leadership, ASA has achieved many milestones toward its goals, including developing and implementing state medical cannabis access programs, protecting state laws through impact litigation, ending the federal interference with state medical cannabis programs, creating federal protections for medical professionals, creating product safety standards for the cannabis and hemp supply chain and trainings for regulators and workers to adhere to them, participating in efforts to reschedule cannabis in the U.S., supporting the FDA with a new approach and data to establish “currently accepted medical use,” removing federal barriers to research, coordinating efforts at the World Health Organization (WHO) to recognizes the therapeutic uses of cannabis, and ultimately changing the schedule of cannabis in internationally.
Sherer is returning to the role of Executive Director after spending several years advancing federal medical cannabis frameworks abroad, guiding cutting-edge research initiatives, and reforming international drug treaties. Sherer will lead a renewed, nationwide effort to fully integrate cannabis-based medicines into the U.S. healthcare system.
