Pubdate: Sun, 26 Jun 2005
Source: Victoria Times-Colonist (CN BC)
1-424b-90bd-7e65ae3cae88
Copyright: 2005 Times Colonist
Contact:  http://www.canada.com/victoria/timescolonist/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/481
Author: Norma Greenaway, CanWest News Service
Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/mmjcn.htm (Cannabis - Medicinal - Canada)

OTTAWA TO EASE RULES FOR MEDICAL MARIJUANA

OTTAWA -- Under fire by critics for providing a half-hearted, and
overly-restrictive medical marijuana program, the federal government
government will unveil new regulations this week designed to ease the onus
on physicians and patients.

A major change drops the demand that doctors agree in writing that the
benefits of smoking marijuana outweigh the risks to their patients. Doctors
had balked at being obliged to make such a statement in the absence of
marijuana being an approved therapeutic product.

"Applicants say it's hard to find doctors," Valerie Lasher, the manager of
Health Canada's medical marijuana program, said as she briefed a reporter on
the changes. "What we have tried to do is streamline the regulations."

The new regime ends the requirement that one specialist, and in some cases
two, must sign the application. From now on, the signature of a general
practitioner will suffice, as long as in some defined cases, the physician
provides the name of a specialist the patient has seen in the last year.

In the case of patients with terminal illnesses, doctors signing their
applications for medical marijuana will no longer have to state the person
will die within a year. The doctor only has to state the patient is
suffering from a terminal illness.

The new regulations for the five-year-old program are slated to be published
Wednesday in the Canada Gazette.

Medical pot users, health professionals and politicians have slagged the
government program for everything from supplying bad weed to being too
restrictive about who qualifies as a licenced medical marijuana user or
grower. They charged the application forms were a "bureaucratic maze."

Lasher said building the program has been "challenging."

But she refused to apologize for the quality of the marijuana, which she
said was research grade and sells for $5 a gram, or half the blackmarket
rate.

Nor is she apologetic about the progress made in implementing one of the
world's only government-run medical marijuana programs for people suffering
from terminal illnesses and such conditions as AIDS, multiple sclerosis and
epilepsy.

"It's evolving," she said. "We are in the vanguard on this. We didn't really
have anybody else to copy."

"This is marijuana for medical purposes," she said. "It's not about
legalization. It's not about decriminalization. It's not about recreation.
It's about giving people access to a product that they honestly believe is
the best, if not the only treatment for them."

Lasher conceded almost all applications so far have been slowed or listed as
"dormant" because they have arrived with something missing, usually the
required medical signatures.

The Canadian Medical Association has resisted the program from Day 1 on
grounds marijuana is an unproven therapy and an illegal drug.

Dr. Albert Schumacher, president of the CMA, said he's eager to see the new
regulations when they are published this week.

"We have a lot of concerns with the way the physician was sandwiched into
the process for something that was unproven therapy," he said in an
interview.

He predicted the vast majority of Canadian doctors will continue to refuse
to sign medical marijuana applications until there is evidence pot has
therapeutic value.

NDP MP Libby Davies says the government's approach has forced thousands of
sick Canadians to turn to illegal sources for their marijuana.

It's obvious the government was dragged "kicking and screaming" into
providing a medical marijuana program after the Ontario Court of Appeal
ruled in 2000 that banning marijuana for medical purposes violates the
Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms, she said.

Davies contends the low number of people qualifying and using the federal
program tell the story.

As of June 3 this year, a total of 864 people were authorized to possess
marijuana for medical purposes, 636 persons were allowed to cultivate it for
that purpose, and 143 people were receiving medical marijuana from the
government's $5.7 million grow operation in an abandoned mine in Flin Flon,
Man. The operation is run by Prairie Plant Systems Inc. in Saskatoon.

Lasher refused to characterize the uptake as small, arguing there are no
reliable numbers on how many Canadians are using marijuana for medical
purposes. She acknowledged, however, the product is easier to come by on the
black market. 
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