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Pot for Pain? This Is Your Law on Drugs

Canada's medical marijuana regime in shambles, say critics.

By Tom Sandborn, 20 Dec 2010, TheTyee.ca

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Imagine that you have a painful, debilitating medical or psychological condition. You and your doctor agree that a certain medicine is the best available treatment. Now imagine that, rather than taking your doctor's note into the nearest drug store and waiting a few minutes while the pleasant young person behind the counter fills your prescription, you have to send off forms to Ottawa and wait as long as eight to 10 months before you can get your medicine. In the meantime, if you find a way to access what you need in a less formal way, you live every day with the prospect of armed men in body armor breaking into your home and arresting you.

For many Canadians who could benefit from judicious access to medical marijuana, the scenario sketched out above isn't a thought experiment or a late-night horror movie. It is their reality every day as they live under Canada's current legal regime for medical marijuana use, a regime that critics say is unconstitutional, unnecessarily cumbersome, and dangerous for seriously ill patients.

Dori Dempster is one of those patients. Suffering from post-traumatic stress syndrome, chronic pain, anxiety and depression, the Vancouver woman has been licensed to use medical marijuana legally since 2005. However, her license (which the government will only issue one year at a time) expired on July 25, and she has still not received a new one, she told The Tyee. Because of the delay, she has effectively seen her medicinal use of cannabis re-criminalized by the long wait for renewal. Her husband, also a licensed medical marijuana user with a permit that expired on July 25, finally received his renewal recently, 158 days after submitting his application to Health Canada.

Dempster's personal experience with medical cannabis and the daunting difficulties that surround accessing it have turned her into an activist. She now manages the Vancouver Medicinal Cannabis Dispensary and its two local outlets.

A million possible patients?

The stories Dempster tells are typical of many across Canada, according to Jacob Hunter, policy director for the Beyond Prohibition Foundation. He says that far too many Canadians who could benefit from using medical marijuana are being delayed, discouraged and, in some cases, driven into the black market to obtain the only medicine that can relieve their symptoms.

"Up to a million Canadians, it has been estimated in the Canadian Addiction Survey, could benefit from using medical marijuana," Hunter told The Tyee. "This isn't just giggling hippies looking to get stoned. These are people with painful conditions, many of them older patients. They are too often subject to delays and harassment."

Many doctors hesitant to prescribe

"A huge number of doctors here in Vancouver refuse to sign the medical declaration form that patients need to access the government program," continued Hunter. "I have been told repeatedly by physicians that the Canadian Medical Protective Association has been warning doctors not to sign the declaration forms, saying that to do so puts a doctor at risk for higher insurance premiums, liability for court action, and, in the case of doctors working here on visa from overseas, of losing their work permit here in Canada."

The Canadian Medical Protective Association describes itself on its website in these words:

"For over a century, the CMPA has demonstrated its commitment to protecting the professional integrity of its members. Members can contact the CMPA for advice on a broad range of medico-legal issues arising from their professional work in Canada. They receive the benefit of advice from people who understand their situation -- experienced medical officers who are physicians with clinical practice backgrounds in various practices and specialties. These medical officers are available to provide advice and, when warranted, arrange further legal assistance for matters arising from a member's professional work."

The CMPA, contacted by phone and email, did not respond directly to questions about whether it was discouraging member physicians from signing declaration forms for their patients. However, Chris Becker, a policy analyst with CMPA did direct The Tyee to his organization's website and a document for physicians that reads in part: "The CMPA recommends physicians who complete the medical declaration ask the applicant to sign the CMPA's release from liability form. Physicians may want to keep copies of this form on hand for future use."

Becker also directed The Tyee to another section of the CMPA website that deals with the medical marijuana physician's declaration form that says "Physicians are not obliged to complete a Medical Declaration if they feel it is medically inappropriate. If a physician chooses to complete a Medical Declaration, it is important to be aware of the risks and to communicate openly with the patient."

Compassion club raids

Hunter said that one person he knew had been to 43 different Lower Mainland doctors looking for one who would endorse his access to medical marijuana, all to no avail. He noted that illegal "compassion clubs" take up the slack created by the federal system's delays and obstructions and offer patients a better choice of varieties of cannabis so they can tailor their medicine to their distinctive needs.

"The federal system for medical cannabis isn't adequate to the needs of Canadians, and in some jurisdictions the formally illegal compassion clubs are under police attack," Hunter said. "In Quebec the only three publicly operating compassion clubs were raided this summer. In Ontario, two clubs were raided this year, one of them twice. Lots of people are fearful across Canada that more raids are on the way."

Kirk Tousaw, a prominent B.C. criminal defense lawyer and executive director of the Beyond Prohibition Foundation told The Tyee that Canada's federal program for access to medical marijuana is "desperately in need of reform." He said that the program, now nearly a decade old, had been forced upon the government by a crucial decision in the Ontario Court of Appeal, R v Parker in 2000.

"After Parker, the government was looking down the barrel of a gun, forced to create a regime that would meet the Charter objections cited by the Ontario court," he said. "The program was deeply flawed from its inception, and has not been significantly improved over the decade, despite several decisions that have called for remedies to the Charter breaches still in place."

Wait time up to eight months

"The system is overburdened," Tousaw said. "It used to take eight weeks for applications to be processed, but now I've had people waiting as long as eight months. The government says on its Health Canada website that it is trying to get the wait time back down to eight weeks, but even that is far too long to wait for needed medicine. If the doctor gives you a prescription for Oxycontin, you can get it filled today. Why should marijuana be any different?"

Tousaw said that the Ministry of Health has stopped updating its website's report on how many Canadians have qualified to access medical marijuana, but his best estimate is that approximately 10,000 licenses have been issued.

The Health Canada website on medical marijuana sternly cautions its readers that cannabis is still illegal in Canada, and reaffirms that the government does not approve of any move toward general legalization, warning:

"Marihuana for medical use should not be confused with the movement to legalize marihuana for general consumption. Health Canada does not advocate the legalization of marihuana. Marihuana remains an illegal and controlled substance, similar to other controlled products. Unlawful possession is a criminal offence."

It does note, however, that medical cannabis licensing is available for patients suffering from MS, arthritis, spinal cord injury and disease, cancer, epilepsy and HIV AIDS. Licensed users can buy supplies or seeds from the government-contracted underground grow-op in Flin Flon, Manitoba, Prairie Plant Systems.

The PPS cannabis is all grown from one strain of cannabis sativa, which is a sore point for many critics, who argue that different strains of both cannabis sativa and cannabis indica have different medicinal properties. A more humane medical marijuana system, they argue, would allow patients to grow their own from different seed lines or access an array of cannabis products made from different strains.

And so the debate goes on, with thousands of Canadians doing without medicine they need, with law and order advocates uncomfortable with the minimal access to medical marijuana available under the current jerry-rigged system, and with medical pot proponents arguing for much wider access through private growers and compassion clubs like the one where Dori Dempster works in Vancouver. Meanwhile, Dempster, like many others, is still waiting for her license to be renewed.

[Editor's note: Jacob Hunter and Kirk Tousaw sit on the board of the BC Civil Liberties Association with Tom Sandborn.] [Tyee]

Tom Sandborn covers health policy and labour beats for The Tyee. He welcomes your story tips and feedback here.

20 Comments:

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  • Dan the socialist

    1 year ago

    Well when Harper gets his

    Well when Harper gets his majority next year, this programme unfortunately will be eliminated.

  • Member121

    1 year ago

    If the MMAR is unconstitutional then...

    If the MMAR is unconstitutional then the law prohibiting the possession of cannabis is also unconstitutional... according to the Parker case mentioned in the article.

    For a more thorough explanation see www.ccldr.net

  • demotto

    1 year ago

    Big Pharma

    Big Pharma does not want people using a safe remedy they and the Government would rather people die from the use of their dangerous drugs

    It is illegal but is it unlawful.

    If it is legal to do with licence it must also be lawful to do without.

    Everyone has the following fundamental freedoms
    (a)freedom of conscience and religion
    This from the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms covers everything.

    conscience, noun.
    1. the sense of right and wrong; ideas and feelings within a person that tell him when he is doing right and warn him of what is wrong.

    This tells me we have the right to choose for ourselves what is right and wrong and as long as you are doing no harm to another or their property there can be no offence committed. The State can not be harmed it is only a fiction on a piece of paper.

  • pianosaurus rex

    1 year ago

    discussion long gone

    Marijuana has become an irrelevant discussion over the years. Anyone who wants to possess and use this drug is using it now; whatever law prohibiting it use notwithstanding.

    The prohibition of this and many other drugs simply makes the law an ass in the eyes of many, not only the boomers age group but including a large percentage of the youth in our society.

    People lived for and treated illnesses for countless centuries before anyone even heard of Big Pharma and their paternalistic outlook on treatment of certain illness and remedies…...

    The crap grown in Flin Flon is not worth ingesting. The quality of that product is the laughing stock of the entire marijuana business. Just goes to show you that if you would like a program screwed up to its fullest invite the government to get involved.

  • dongzo

    1 year ago

    we should all start mentioning the real reason

    the real reason that cannabis is illegal is that for some people, it makes them think.

    free thinkers are not slaves and profit and power, they are competition. If you're finding ways to fuck over the next guy and feel good about it, (...do i hear capitalism) the last think you want is people saying "ow, that hurts, i'm not going to do this any more."

    GENERAL STRIKE

  • wakeywakeyppl

    1 year ago

    Why Marihuana is Illegal

    The reason marihuana is illegal is because it is an illicit drug. People get high on it. All this b.s. about medical marihuana is just an ok for getting stoned with permission. It is not a medicine it does not solve or cure anything rather it makes the person even more confused. There are plenty of natural cures and they don't make you stoned. It should not be legal and I hope it never will be. There are many cases of psychosis caused from smoking pot and people who are chronic pot smokers are unable to think rationally and clearly, they can be a danger to themselves and others, they forget things and are lazy. Pot should stay illegal. I hope Harper gets rid of this stupid program.

  • billow

    1 year ago

    weed for pain

    what does it take for the government to grasp the idea that weed is a drug that doesn't hurt the organs and does the trick.

  • demotto

    1 year ago

    44 years on

    After 44 years as a smoker of the illicit drug I am neither a danger to myself or anyone else. I was a workaholic(cured myself of that thankfully) so the statement of making one lazy just is not the truth as now being a gardener I still put in a decent days work so as to put food on the table and away for the winter. Several people I know use it to control the pain of rheumatism, another uses it to control epileptic seizures of which he used to get many very bad fits and now has them hardly ever. Big Pharma drugs all have side effects that can be and often are worse than what they claim to cure, even causing death in many cases, not so for marijuana as there has never been a reported death from its use.

  • Bailey

    1 year ago

    Don't let's forget the money

    The prohibition of drugs created a monopoly more or less, on the supply of addictive stimulants. It did so just at the moment when the previous monopoly, alcohol, which had created some truly massive fortunes among the criminal classes, was being dismantled and brought under regulatory control.

    Marijuana, as I heard on the noisybox recently, is worth more as a cash crop in the US than corn, soybeans and something else I can't remember combined.

    As Carl Sagan might have intoned, Billions and billions of little Yankeebucks, funding groups who almost gleefully donate to every single political candidate and party that ever had the remotest chance of election.

    Hands up those who think the US Congress will ever dismantle the unregulated monopoly of the cartels over the supply of addictive stimulants.

  • Intention Pure

    1 year ago

    Corporate Domination

    Corporate domination of the Hemp plant; the most versatile, usable, medicinal, and easily grown plant on Earth.

    It is a complete food, is a textile for cloth and rope, makes paper, the cellulose makes undentable material for vehicles, makes fuel, it is a topical and ingestable panacea for healing acute, chronic and "terminal" diseases used for milennia, it leaves the soil in better condition than before planting, it grows like a weed and reseeds itself each year. THIS IS WHY IT IS CONTROLLED.

    It has very little to do with "getting people high". That was a corporate "powers that be" propaganda scheme to scare people and brainwash them so "the powers that be" could deny the value of hemp as a sustainable and pollution free material resource and food for humanity. The below interview with Rick Simpson and Max Igan tells it all. If you have an illness watch and listen to this youtube video from Crowhouse Channel.
    http://www.youtube.com/aodscarecrow#p/a/u/0/r2IPn0QTNA4

  • samuidave (not verified)

    1 year ago

    This sort of governmental interference...

    coupled with the illegitimate propaganda war against, arguably, the most versatile plant on the planet makes a laughing stock out of the institution itself.

  • samuidave (not verified)

    1 year ago

    as usual, canada is obeying its orders

    http://blogs.alternet.org/speakeasy/2010/12/14/drug-czar-blames-rising-teen-pot-use-on-medical-cannabis-laws-rather-than-on-his-own-failed-policies/

  • ProChron

    1 year ago

    Really??@ wakeywakeyppl

    EDITED FOR PERSONAL INSULTS TO ANOTHER COMMENTER. MODERATOR

    Cannabis has saved so many lives in so many different ways making your views undeniably based on media and/or religious upbringing. Vaporized or orally ingested cannabis is absolutely harmless and the minor harm inflicted by smoking is not even a fraction of damage done by cigarettes and alcohol, both legal and deadly substances. The cases you speak of about Marihuana causing psychosis are as hilariously invalid as the "studies" conducted to "prove" that weed kills brain cells. Not going to explain that American "study" to you but lack of oxygen was the answer. New studies conducted by scientists and doctors of all sorts are revealing cell regrowth with cannabis use. Being part of a medicinal cannabis facility that is adding to the research with skilled practitioners and intriguing technology, I've seen what this plant in it's many consumable forms has done for people and it is not a joke as you have implied. EDITED

  • pianosaurus rex

    1 year ago

    A license? What for?

    Yes for wakeywakey it is actually time to wakey I guess……I need permission to get stoned now do I?? what? From some document the government serves up to me…..time for reality…….no one pays any attention to the marijuana laws any longer. What those laws reveal to everyone is that the government is out of touch with public sentiment on the matter.

    Like I stated previously anyone who wants to use this plant is not going to sit idly by and wait for permission from the government….

    Keeping this variety of plant species illegal just fuels the criminal gangs source of income...as long as Canada is next door to the biggest denier of reality (US) nothing will change. So the end result is the law becomes irrelevant in people’s lives.

    The license system is just a way for the government to placate the conservative view in this country. This is how the government tries to exercise control over something it has no control over. It demonstrates that the government is actively doing something about this problem…like it is a problem to begin with……. a shortage of Doritos locally is not an insurmountable problem……

  • morechatter

    1 year ago

    Don't forget to take your meds

    It is what it comes down to medical pot keeps the doctor from writing out all those pescriptions that take about 5 seconds of their time to fill out. Did you know most patients already know what meds they are going to get from the doctor?
    I ran a medical clinic when younger and not a patient got out of there without a perscription in hand and an x-ray. The old doc was fined a couple hundred grand for his naughty behavior but oh there was so much more.

  • ProChron

    1 year ago

    wow

    "It is what it comes down to medical pot keeps the doctor from writing out all those pescriptions that take about 5 seconds of their time to fill out."

    The process to obtain a medical marihuana perscription is far more complicated for a practitioner than a simple pharmaceutical. Your statement is either implying that or it makes no sense at all and you are just as uninformed as wakeywakeyppl. Cannabis is medicine and far more medicinal than the death drugs the pharmaceutical companies like to shove down your throats. Pharmaceutical drugs are used to make hard street drugs whereas Cannabis has been made a street drug by prohibition.

  • morechatter

    1 year ago

    Five seconds to write out prescriptions

    Not for med pot but for everything else and if you want to purchase medical pot all you do is get a doctor to confirm your aliment and no need for prescription to buy from clubs.
    The long forms are for growing and holding larger amounts and need a doctor to fill out to send to the feds.

  • morechatter

    1 year ago

    Patients can sign release

    http://www.medicalmarijuana.ca/for-patients/get-medical-marijuana

    If you just want to purchase med pot get a form from a club and it only takes the doctor's confirmation of your illness to buy at the clubs. You do not need the doctor's approval.
    There is one or two clubs that will use your perscription bottle as confirmation and supply medical pot without seeing a doctor at all.

  • macadavy

    1 year ago

    Legalize it already!

    I am a person with HIV disease who waited more than 7 months for Health Canada approval. Thank the goddess for compassion clubs! Thank you Dori for speaking up on behalf of all of us.
    Legalize it already: treat it like alcohol. No access for minors; government stores with some private outlets (compassion clubs); sin tax it to death if you must. But most important of all: just as any adult Canadian can make a resonable amount of his or her own beer and wine for personal cosumption and for gifting family and friends, (but not for sale) - let us grow our own!

  • ProChron

    1 year ago

    @morechatter

    Not sure where you're from but where I am a doctors approval is needed as well as a prescription. It is also harder to get than pharmaceutical prescriptions... I manage a dispensary in my area and we are 100% legit as far as the law is concerned and it is tough to obtain a membership here.

    And to the moderators of this site: shame on you for your ridiculous censorship by editing my posts... I made no personal insults that were not warranted. My language was clean and my point was made. You obviously
    Prefer less educated people to have the majority here. Unruly censorship shows your immaturity aswell...

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