Assessment of dronabinol and its stereo-isomers

F. WHO Review History: Dronabinol was included in Schedule I of the 1971 Convention on Psychotropic Substances at the time of its adoption as Delta-9tetrahydrocannabinol together with several other isomers of tetrahydrocannabinol. At its 26 meeting, ECDD recommended that dronabinol, which is the (-)-trans isomer of delta-9-tetrahydrocannabinol, be moved to Schedule II, while keeping the other stereoisomer in Schedule I. This proposal was rejected by the Commission on Narcotic Drugs and ECDD reviewed the question again at its 27 meeting in 1990, which recommended that all the stereochemical variants of delta-9-tetrahydrocannabinol be rescheduled to Schedule II. This recommendation was adopted by CND. At the 32 meeting, ECDD pre-reviewed dronabinol and recommended its critical review on the grounds that the rate of abuse of dronabinol was extremely low. Dronabinol was critically reviewed by the 33 ECDD in September 2002. On the basis of the available data the Committee considered that dronabinol should be rescheduled to Schedule IV of the 1971 Convention. However, the procedure was not finished and the Committee's advice was not sent to the CND at that time. For this reason the existing critical review report is updated, including the numerous new scientific publications of the last few years, in order to enable the ECDD to finalize the process of critical review.