cannabisnews.com: Marijuana as Medicine





Marijuana as Medicine
Posted by FoM on December 08, 2001 at 09:12:04 PT
By Aaron Derfel
Source: Montreal Gazette 
Each morning, before even drinking a cup of espresso, Vincenzo Pizzi rolls a marijuana joint and smokes it. "It helps me control my pain," said Pizzi, who walks with a limp, a constant reminder of a near-fatal car crash 18 years ago that put him in a coma for three weeks.Since he started smoking marijuana more than a decade ago, Pizzi has been careful about where he lit up for fear of arrest. These days, however, he doesn't have to worry about breaking the law.
Last October, Health Canada granted the 39-year-old Rivière des Prairies resident the right to possess and grow marijuana for therapeutic purposes. He's one of 38 Canadians who have been "authorized" to do so since the Marijuana Medical Access Regulations came into effect on July 31.Still, the authorization is small consolation. Pizzi can grow marijuana but he is not allowed to buy it. And like many patients who use pot, he isn't keen about having to cultivate it.Pizzi's story is not just about government red tape, but highlights some of the weaknesses with Health Canada's marijuana policy. Health Minister Allan Rock has touted the new regulations as "innovative," saying they have made access to marijuana easier for many patients in chronic pain. Critics, however, accuse Ottawa of tiptoeing around the concerns of law-enforcement and the medical establishment, producing a regulatory hodgepodge that satisfies no one.What's more, Ottawa has contracted Prairie Plant Systems to grow marijuana in a mine in Flin Flon, Man., even though it hasn't figured out yet how it will distribute the weed to patients.Pizzi acts like a tough guy, speaking in a voice hoarse from smoking marijuana all day long. He chuckles when he hands out cards for his part-time business, Cosa Nostra Snow-clearing.When he was not volunteering his time cheering up the elderly at an east-end seniors' residence, Pizzi spent much of the last year on the phone with Health Canada bureaucrats.He applied last February for an exemption to smoke marijuana. He was granted it eight months later, but not until Health Canada required him to first try a wide range of conventional painkillers - something he had already done over the years.He obliged anyway, taking the anti-inflammatory Vioxx, which eases bone pain. Next on the list was Neurontin, an anti-convulsant that is usually prescribed to epileptics. Finally, he tried the anti-depressant Desipramine."I felt like a guinea pig," Pizzi recalled. "They did nothing for me. In fact, one drug made me constipated and another made me impotent."Pizzi sustained a brain concussion in the accident and fractured several vertebrae in his neck. His left leg was crushed, and is now 4 centimetres shorter. Every day since the crash, Pizzi has experienced sharp stabbing pains in his neck and back. Dark circles under his eyes hint at his insomnia. If he moves his left leg ever so slightly while sleeping, he wakes in agony."I tried all the different pain medications, but they didn't do me any good," said Pizzi, who lives in a modest bungalow with his wife and two sons."When I was on morphine, all it did was put me to sleep. When I took Percocets, they gave me panic attacks."When he finally received his federal exemption in the mail on Oct. 9, the moment was decidely anti-climactic.The more he read it, the less clear it seemed to him."I've got two kids at home. Why should I have to grow marijuana? This is like asking a cancer patient to produce his own chemotherapy drugs."Health Canada has received 117 applications to date under the new regulations, and each is carefully reviewed - a process that can take months.Ottawa was forced to come up with the new regulations after the Ontario Court of Appeal last year struck down federal marijuana-possession laws for sick people. The court criticized the arbitrary manner in which Ottawa had granted exemptions to patients, and gave the government one year to redraft the law."The new regulations make access to marijuana for medical purposes clearer and easier all around," said Jody Gomber, director-general of the controlled-substances program at Health Canada.In the absence of a government-approved marijuana supply, Pizzi buys pot regularly from the Compassion Club on Rachel St. It's one of 10 clubs that have sprouted up across the country in the last couple of years, operating in a legal gray zone and under surveillance by police.The Plateau Mont-Royal club sells marijuana to more than 50 steady customers - people suffering from AIDS, cancer, multiple sclerosis and other diseases. The tiny shop stocks a wide variety of marijuana that go by colourful names like Blueberry, Northern Light and Zero Zero. Police raided the club last year and arrested two men for possession and trafficking. A judgment is expected in their case next Wednesday.On a cold autumn afternoon, Pizzi stepped into the club, eager to buy some marijuana to last him through the week. He took out eight $20 bills from his pocket - enough money to buy 10 grams of Blueberry, a highly potent brand. He disappeared into a back room with club volunteer Pierre Hamel and emerged a minute later with his stash tucked in a coat pocket.Hamel, a short, thin man, greets customers warmly. He sat down behind a desk and reflected on the new regulations. They're overly bureaucratic, he contended, and the requirement that the patient grow marijuana is absurd.The regulations stipulate that an individual can grow up to 15 plants indoors and store a sizeable quantity of 675 grams. Patients can carry on their person up to 90 grams."Most sick people are too weak to grow marijuana," Hamel said. "They can barely take care of themselves, let alone tend to a marijuana plant."The regulations foresee such a Catch-22, and allow for a "designated" person to grow marijuana on the patient's behalf. However, the designated grower must submit to a background police check going back 10 years and can only cultivate marijuana for one patient - conditions that hardly encourage volunteers, Hamel suggested.Gomber, of Health Canada, defended the ban on buying pot as prudent."We're talking about a substance that is actually prohibited by law, and these regulations are in place to remove the legal prohibition under certain circumstances."Under the old system, the decision to grant an exemption was left largely to the discretion of the Health Minister. The new regulations specify three categories of patients. The terminally ill - those who have less than a year to live - belong to the first category.Those suffering from cancer, AIDS, HIV infection, MS, spinal cord injury or disease, epilepsy and severe arthritis are considered category-2 patients. Pizzi, who doesn't have any of those diseases, is a category-3 patient. Health Canada created the third category for patients who are in excruciating pain, but whose ailments don't fall under the first two categories.At first glance, the third category appears to be quite inclusive. Not so, Hamel said, noting category-three patients require the medical opinions of at least two doctors. This could lead to contrary opinions for some illnesses like fibromyalgia, a muscle disorder causing chronic pain and fatigue, that's often hard to diagnose.In such a circumstance, a patient might be denied the right to use pot despite having tried in vain all the conventional pain treatments, Hamel said.Early next year, Prairie Plant Systems is expected to harvest 185 kilograms of marijuana. What Health Canada will do with the weed is uncertain, because many doctors are unwilling to prescribe it.During a visit to Flin Flon last August, Rock declared that "logic led us to the conclusion that we should have a formal government supply."But critics on both sides of the marijuana debate criticize Rock's strategy as illogical - for different reasons."It's completely ridiculous," said Dr. Yves Lamontagne, president of the Quebec College of Physicians. "Are we going to become authorized dealers?"There are two strikes against marijuana, the medical establishment argues. First, it's illegal under the Criminal Code. Second, it has never been approved by Health Canada as a prescription drug. That is important for physicians, because approved drugs must have detailed information on potential side effects as well as the optimal dose.Doctors are particularly worried about the prospect of being sued by patients, a fear raised last month by the Canadian Medical Protective Association - the largest medical malpractice fund in the country."This was a legal problem that was imposed on the federal government by the Ontario court, and instead of looking at it from the legal point of view, they dumped the whole thing in the physicians' back yard," Lamontagne said.There is compelling anecdotal evidence marijuana can relieve nausea induced by chemotherapy, and can stimulate appetite in those suffering from the wasting effects of cancer and AIDS. Marijuana is not without its side-effects, however. While cannabis is far from the most potent painkiller, it can cause confusion and sedation.Sensing that it might have skipped a step in the process, Ottawa has commissioned nearly $1 million in clinical marijuana trials. Dr. Mark Ware will lead one of those studies at the McGill Pain Clinic in the Montreal General Hospital.Part of Ware's research is to determine exactly how the active chemical ingredient in marijuana - known as THC, or tetrahydrocannabinol - works in relieving pain. Ware will also seek to find out whether higher or lower THC levels make a difference.Ware's year-long study is to start in January, and results from that trial and others might not be available for the next couple of years. Until then, doctors will be in the dark as to the safety and efficacy of marijuana, yet Health Canada will be asking them to prescribe it.At the Compassion Club, Hamel dismisses the fact that the Flin Flon grass will contain between five and six per cent THC. In Hamel's experience, MS patients benefit the most from pot with 10 per cent THC."Five-per-cent THC is too weak," he said. "It will force people to smoke too much marijuana unnecessarily."Hamel suggested that the compassion clubs are best suited to dispense marijuana, not to mention the most amendable to the idea, yet Ottawa does not trust them to fulfill that role.Health Canada is hoping that if doctors don't co-operate, perhaps pharmacists might get involved. Gomber confirmed that pharmacies "would definitely be among the routes being considered, because they do have a distribution system in place."In Quebec, the province's order of pharmacists is now drafting a legal opinion on precisely that question."I would say that pharmacists must play a role," said Paul Fernet, president of the order. "When it comes to the control of pharmacology and medicines, that's something that pharmacists do very well."Still, Fernet conceded that some pharmacists might be leery of stocking weed, if only because they might be the targets of armed holdups.Ware, of the McGill Pain Clinic, sympathizes with those frustrated with the new regulations, but he said they're a "brave step in the right direction.""We're in a very important transitional phase at this point: with the cultivators working to produce cannabis for medicinal purposes, with the (marijuana) exemption under development and with a number of other initiatives underway, such as research ... to try to fill the blanks in the picture."For Pizzi, however, the bureaucratic and legal wrangling are proving to be a costly exercise. He has used up a $10,000 personal line of credit to buy pot from the Compassion Club.Note: What the law proscribes is now prescribed by doctors. But the plan has growing pains, including a regulatory hodgepodge that satisfies no one.Newshawk: puff_tuffSource: Montreal Gazette (CN QU)Author: Aaron DerfelPublished: Saturday, December 08, 2001 Copyright: 2001 The Gazette, a division of Southam Inc.Contact: letters thegazette.southam.caWebsite: http://www.montrealgazette.com/Related Articles & Web Sites:Prairie Plant Systemshttp://www.prairieplant.com/ FTE's Canadian Linkshttp://freedomtoexhale.com/can.htmSuffering Few Who Legally Possess Marijuana http://cannabisnews.com/news/thread11135.shtmlDeep In The Ground Lies The Marijuana Farm http://cannabisnews.com/news/thread10509.shtmlPot Law a Bust - Criticshttp://cannabisnews.com/news/thread10480.shtml
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Comment #7 posted by Patrick on December 09, 2001 at 11:11:03 PT
E_Johnson
I have one doctor now who just wants me to shut up and take what he gives me and obey. He's not the one prescribing pot by the way. But this one doctor, I'm ready to fire him now, because he doesn't want to be my ally -- he wants to be my boss. He won't explain anything, he just wants me to take what he prescribes and shut up.The fact that you are ready to fire your doctor shocked me! I have read and enjoyed many of your posts here. I really have. The fact that this clown/doctor (?) isn't already gone from your life is what shocks me the most. I don't much care for doctors. I see doctors like I see car mechanics! You only need one of em when you can't figure out how to fix it yourself. Any doctor that treats people like a pet, a slave, or a lab specimen shouldn't even be licensed to practice medicine in the first place. The characterization I picture of this doctor, is one of a pompous genius surgeon type, (in their own mind), that drives a Ferrari and flies military-style aerial combat missions on Thursday mornings at 10:20 am for "recreation" instead of genuinely caring about your health.E_Johnson, it's easy for me to say this. I am healthy and have no ailments. I can say…If I live to be 100 years old, my life has nearly reached its midpoint. Looking forward, it's a wonderful view from here. I just hope that the light at the end of my tunnel, isn't a train!!! In metaphorical sort of way, I guess that the death experience itself must be like getting run over by a train. Anyway, do not think that for a minute, that I think I am immune to needing the care of a doctor at some point in my life. If a doctor treated me as you have described, it would have been the last time he ever saw me again. I already have met a few of these arrogant bastards and with a simple wave of my mind, I have left them on the side of the road of life. When, in the course of human events, it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bonds which have connected them with another, and to assume among the powers of the earth, the separate and equal station to which the laws of nature and of nature's God entitle them,…I completely agreed with you, E_Johnson, when you said…I think we're lucky that cannabis is here on the Earth because it grows without any doctor ordering it to grow, without any insurance company filling out paperwork for it to grow, without any billions of dollars of investment for a factory to make it grow, without any corporate scientists looking for patents to get rich from having figured out how to make it grow...I also agreed with p4me saying…Healthcare needs reform. Law enforcement needs reform. The judicial system needs reform. The media needs to hang their head in shame for not telling the truth about MJ especially as a medicine that people could grow. The pill industry is out of control and dictating people's health options even if millions are denied liberty for trying to make things better.And I am saying that with all the ways there are to die on this planet, we shouldn't be spending our taxes arresting people who choose to eat, drink, and occasionally smoke the fruit of one of God's little plants?????????????????????????????????????????????????? Dali himself couldn't have painted a more absurd or surreal scene.
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Comment #6 posted by CongressmanSuet on December 08, 2001 at 21:06:04 PT:
 Pd4me, it could always be worse...
   Im a medical user with diagnosed, advanced COPD[53% lung function], a nasty hiatial hernia, recently diagnosed Pheochromocytoma[active adrenal tumor] AND Renaud's Disease [ did I mention MY colonoscopy this year, you know, the one where they removed the bloody polyps?]. My pill bill comes to 377.00 a month. I have had had chronic lung problems for over 15 years, yet I have to continue to pay hundreds a year to have a doc look at me quick, and say, refill his prescriptions. I currently use 2 types of inhalers on a constant basis, and supplement those drugs with small amounts of Cannabis. I have found that if I run out of my prescription drugs early, Cannabis is enough to get me thru till I can refill. By themselves my inhalers are fairly effective, but with Cannabis added, I get incredible relief, that requires me to take less of my prescription drugs[ one is a steroid, and I dont like the side effects, so the less I take, the better]. The medical establishment today has become so perverted and tolerant of mediocrity, when such a supposeddly "altruistic" profession can become so money oriented, so greedy, we have reached a new plateau. I have a perfect example of medicines future...there is an approved, new treatment for coronary blockages that is non-invasive, using a machine that actually forces blood thru areas of your arteries unclogging Them. This has been 88% successful. I know about this because I own stock in the co [VASOmed]. The cost of the treatments run around 6000 complete. Simmilar surgry runs over 25000. The bigest opponent of this new treatment is the American Academy of Surgeons. They claim more studies need to be done before they are replaced by a machine and a technician. And finally, my last, and favorite point...will there ever be a cure for cancer? Yes, there will, when all those billions of dollars that feed oncologists greedy dreams, that pay for big corporate headquarters of cancer associations, that pay for hospice care and chemotherapy regimens are actually applied for research like they should be. Im tired, time for my nightly prilosec and cannabis based expectorant....
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Comment #5 posted by p4me on December 08, 2001 at 12:21:23 PT
Ejohnson
That was an excellent peace you wrote in post number 4. Medicine is unbelievable expensive and it denies people care.I have ulcerous colitus and medicine is more expensive when you do not have insurance. My doctor cost $90 to see. I have a chronic disease that I will have the rest of my life just like I have had it the last 25 years. My doctor will require a colonoscopy every two years that cost about $1600 with insurance negotiating the price and about $2400 for me as an individual because they can pass the cost of nonpaying patients on to me.I know what I have. The medicine is just a simple sulfur compound and its only warning label is to stay out of direct sunlight which I avoid because of the increased UV light we now experience. Why can I not just get a prescription for life because it can not just go away. No one would abuse this if it cost money. It is all but harmless. There can be severe bleeding with this disease and it can kill you in a matter of minutes if an artery ruptures. I have called doctors saying I was bleeding and before they would prescribe this simple compound they wanted several thousand in cash in advance and did not care whether I lived or died.Healthcare needs reform. Law enforcement needs reform. The judicial system needs reform. The media needs to hang their head in shame for not telling the truth about MJ especially as a medicine that people could grow. The pill industry is out of control and dictating people's health options even if millions are denied liberty for trying to make things better.Puff-tuff: That was an excellent link to Governor Johnson and the head of the Liedelman Instite, Dr. Liedelman. If it were not for the internet we all would be ignorant of what is going on. I posted that to a forum I participate in. Some people think that medical MJ is a joke. I call them ignorant and opinionated and closeminded people that do not even care about the sick and dying.Why doesn't one reporter go to a DEA office and have them explain in simple English how the government could even take an opinionthat says MJ has no medicinal value. One source said that Encyclopedia.com said that MJ was included in the "United States Pharmacopie" from 1850 to 1942. Why can they not get one person to ask "How could you not think that MJ had medicinal value?"Vote against all incumbents and boycott the media's products or any products that are not essential. Somebody needs to think of the pain that the government is causing to the sick and dying and have a thrifty meal at home instead of eating out. As Virgil said in the Art of poetry: "What is the value of a thrifty meal?"A good friend of mine is just a good old boy now in his 50's. His adult son is a Sheriff's Deputy. I was talking to my friend about a poem that was written by a famous American author that I cannot recall. It was a great poem about perspective because the gravedigger was talking about how much easier it would be to dig a childs grave after he finished the whole he was in. He did not think of the tragedy of the death of a child nor would he feel for the ones that would attend the funeral. Of course my friend is a gravedigger and can hardly walk from climbing up and down off his backhoe and moving it from graveyard to graveyard. He has no money because his insurance is so high after his heart attack. I could not talk much with him about cannabis because his son is a Deputy. Thats terrible when you really cannot even speak your mind because the pill industry wants the world to see through its perspective and do everything to quiet my voice.It is really unbelievable to me and no one else seems to mind.
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Comment #4 posted by E_Johnson on December 08, 2001 at 11:27:56 PT
Does Health Canada assume liabilitity for this?
He obliged anyway, taking the anti-inflammatory Vioxx, which eases bone pain. Next on the list was Neurontin, an anti-convulsant that is usually prescribed to epileptics. Finally, he tried the anti-depressant Desipramine."I felt like a guinea pig," Pizzi recalled. "They did nothing for me. In fact, one drug made me constipated and another made me impotent."Under the Canadian system, can the health system be sued for having forced him to experience these known side effects of these dangerous drugs?It's sounds really horribly primitive, to force people into medical experimentation when they already have a therapy they are satisfied with that works.There should be some kind of patient's rights that prevents this from happening. I mean for ALL patients not just the ones using marijuana.There's too much powerlessness in the health care system, everywhere. Doctors don't know what they want. Do they want to be partners, allies or in control?I have one doctor now who just wants me to shut up and take what he gives me and obey. He's not the one prescribing pot by the way. But this one doctor, I'm ready to fire him now, because he doesn't want to be my ally -- he wants to be my boss. He won't explain anything, he just wants me to take what he prescribes and shut up.This struggle with marijuana is really tied to other struggles over the use and abuse of authority in modern society. Modern medical science and technology are so damned expensive, and this adds a huge pressure to the system because the more expensive medicine becomes, the more burden there is on the problem of delivering care equally without regard to socioeconomic status.Doctors are under huge pressure to be efficient, and this goes against the whole caring instinct and brings out other parts of their instincts that are not caring.There are huge problems going on under the skin of the health care system in America. Los Angeles is on the verge f a crisis. I think we're lucky that cannabis is here on the Earth because it grows without any doctor ordering it to grow, without any insurance company filling out paperwork for it to grow, without any billions of dollars of investment for a factory to make it grow, without any corporate scientists looking for patents to get rich from having figured out how to make it grow...It's comforting to know that whether or not the rest of the health care system in the world will survive the coming impact ef global warming and water shortages and population shifts and desertification and the loss of ecosystem, and everything else down the line in our troubled future on this planet -- the healing powers of cannabis are beyond modern control.So they will also be beyond modern collapse as well.If it comes to that...Probably modern society will survive, but modern medicine is going to have to change, because that is on the verge of collapse right now, and the response to marijuana is symptomatic of that process of collapse.As evidenced in this case right here. How much money did Health Canada waste forcing these expensive modern patented medicines on this man? If they do this to everyone who could benefit from garden-grown cannabis, who's going to pay the bill?
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Comment #3 posted by lookinside on December 08, 2001 at 10:46:58 PT:
having...
that picture is depressing...those appear to be some low potency ditchweed (u.s. government seeds?) nodel length is way long...people will ignore the government stuff of that quality...
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Comment #2 posted by FoM on December 08, 2001 at 10:10:37 PT
Question
This picture was taken on or about August 2, 2001. I would really like to see a picture of how the plants are doing now. Are there any pictures anywhere does anyone know?http://www.freedomtoexhale.com/flin.jpg
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Comment #1 posted by goneposthole on December 08, 2001 at 09:31:00 PT
maintaining sanity
Under the circumstances, most of us want to live lives with as few emcumbrances as possible and the government be damned.With any luck, that will be the case.
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