Pubdate: Fri, 20 Jul 2001 Source: Parksville Qualicum Beach News (CN BC) Copyright: 2001 Parksville Qualicum Beach News Contact: http://www.pqbnews.com/ Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/1361 Author: Tom MacDougall Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/mmjcn.htm (Cannabis - Medicinal - Canada) POT FOR PAIN CLUB LAUNCHED Mark Russell knows the club he's starting Monday is against the law. He's hoping he'll be a low priority for the Oceanside RCMP detachment, because he believes there's a public health need for the club. But he knows an arrest is a possibility. For the last six years, Russell has run The Hemp Store in Coombs in relative obscurity, attracting little attention with the sale of hemp products and marijuana paraphernalia. That could change when he opens a new branch of the Vancouver Island Cannabis Buyers Club. Taking its lead from changes to the Controlled Drugs and Substances Act scheduled to take effect July 30, the club will allow people with demonstrable chronic pain or illness to purchase marijuana. The changes to the act deal with the medical use of marijuana, providing some regulatory protection for individuals using cannabis for a prescribed number of medical conditions. "We're going to follow Health Canada's mandate as best we can, but they're way too restrictive," said Russell. Health Canada has set out three categories of eligibility: Category 1 is for terminal patients (expected to die within 12 months), who will have the easiest access to the required licensing to use the drug. Category 2 covers patients with cancer, AIDS, HIV, multiple sclerosis, spinal cord injury, epilepsy or severe arthritis (among others) for the treatment of nausea, weight loss, muscle spasms and pain. Category 3 is more generalized, allowing for those patients not identified in the other two categories to make application. Patients will have to apply to Health Canada, providing doctor-supplied documentation of the illness and confirmation that other options have been considered. In category 3, a second opinion by another specialist is also required. "All we're going to require is proof of illness," said Russell. "You have to be genuinely in chronic pain or chronic illness. We will be very strict on that." To prove illness, Russell will be looking for a doctor's note or other corroborating evidence. The club, said Russell, will provide a clean source of the drug for people using the service, with the plants being inspected by Russell to make sure they are free of mould and are of a consistent potency. "We have to be very careful because people with AIDS, for example, can't have moldy weed. Quality control will be in place." Careful and strict or not, Russell's club still falls outside the law. Health Canada's new regulations do not recognize buyers clubs, cooperatives or compassion clubs, and is not prepared to licence such organizations to produce or sell marijuana. But other than allowing the licenced patient or a designated assistant to grow the plant for use, there is no other legal source for patients. There's not even a current legal source for seeds. Russell believes that's where clubs come in. And despite the fact he has spent the last six years distancing himself from the sale of the drug - although he has been an outspoken advocate of its use as a medicinal and the need for broad spectrum decriminalization - he says he's willing to take the risk. "All of this time I've been afraid of doing it. Too much to lose. I'd lose my property, my livelihood," said Russell, continuing to say with the new legislation, now seems like the right time. The provincial coordinator for the drug enforcement service, Staff Sgt. Chuck Doucette, says that as far as the RCMP is concerned, compassion clubs and buying clubs are still illegal unless they have successfully applied to the Ministry of Health and received a licence. "Nothing has been issued to us that we should ignore compassion clubs," said Doucette. "In our opinion, they should be going through that [application] process." - --- MAP posted-by: Terry Liittschwager