cannabisnews.com: Medicinal Marijuana Use Divides Physicians





Medicinal Marijuana Use Divides Physicians
Posted by CN Staff on July 11, 2003 at 14:59:09 PT
By Eliza Barlow
Source: Brandon Sun 
A Brandon doctor says he has no qualms about dispensing medicinal marijuana from his office and doesn't see why so many medical officials are speaking out against the federal government's new policy. Doctors now have the authority to dispense medicinal marijuana from their offices, under the latest plan from Health Canada. "If it was legal for me to do that, I wouldn't hesitate," says Dr. Paul Conyette, a family physician at the naturopathic clinic Canadian Biologics in Brandon.
"It's a very good herb. I welcome the use of medicinal marijuana by the medical community, because it validates what naturopathic physicians and complimentary alternative medical practitioners have been saying for years - herbs are strong, herbs have use, herbs have benefits."Health Canada will start delivering marijuana seeds or mature leaves, grown in Flin Flon, to doctors' offices as early as next week.Only about 600 Canadians are authorized to legally buy the drug for medicinal use.The Canadian Medical Association is decrying the plan, advising doctors not to dispense marijuana because, it says, the drug has not gone through adequate clinical trials.Dr. Bill Pope, registrar of the College of Physicians and Surgeons of Manitoba, disapproves of medicinal marijuana and of the government's plan to send the drug to doctors' offices for dispensing."I don't know that it's at all clear that (marijuana) is a particularly good drug for anything," Pope says.Pope acknowledges marijuana may be helpful for certain people with certain illnesses at certain times, but says it should only be given when "a whole pile" of other treatments have failed."It certainly shouldn't be given right off the bat."Pope is concerned about the form in which the drug will be dispensed."You're taking a leaf, crumpling it up, and smoking it," he says, adding he'd rather see the drug in a regulated, pharmalogically-tested form such as a capsule.Several other Brandon physicians contacted by the Brandon Sun refused to comment on the new policy.Conyette says he can't understand why the College and the Canadian Medical Association are having such a negative reaction to the new policy."I think it's interesting that so many clinical trials are necessary before a prescription can be signed for medicinal marijuana, because there are many drugs that are being used that have never passed double-blind placebo controlled studies," he says."Why would medicinal marijuana be singled out, when 80 per cent of many hospital procedures have never been studied with double-blind, placebo controlled tests?In order to be eligible to apply for the legal supply of marijuana, Canadians must meet detailed criteria, such as having a terminal illness.Conyette says he'd like to see people make their own decisions about medicines with less restrictions."In North America, we're plagued with rules and regulations. Rules and regulations are good, but not if people don't have any say in what happens to them in their last days."I'm all in favour of people taking charge of their own pathway to health, as long as there is knowledge and professional guidance behind it."Source: Brandon Sun (CN MB)Author: Eliza BarlowPublished: July 11, 2003Copyright: 2003, Brandon SunContact: gwright brandonsun.comWebsite: http://www.brandonsun.com/Related Articles & Web Site:Canadians for Safe Accesshttp://www.safeaccess.ca/MDs Balk At Dispensing Marijuanahttp://cannabisnews.com/news/thread16830.shtmlOttawa Pot Plan Unworkable: Doctors http://cannabisnews.com/news/thread16819.shtmlCMA Asks Government - Where is the Evidence?http://cannabisnews.com/news/thread16803.shtml
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Comment #15 posted by SoberStoner on July 12, 2003 at 08:47:25 PT
I think we all know this is doomed
Health canada tried to slap a bandaid on a gaping wound to try and stall. The courts seem to realize that making sick people criminals is NOT a thing that a compassionate caring society should do.This plan begins to show why full legalization is the only real answer. There will always be exceptions to whatever rules they implement and there will always be resistance from people who just dont know any better. Remove the criminal stigma and let people who truly know what cannabis can do run the industry. Tax the income made, and tax the product itself, and use those funds for something better than paying court costs for arresting and putting on trial anyone who just wants to relax after work but doesnt want to drink or smoke tobacco. Cannabists are not criminals. We are just everyday people who happen to like enjoying the world around us with a smile on our faces and our eyes wide open...even if they look half-shutPeace and loveSS 
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Comment #14 posted by afterburner on July 12, 2003 at 07:52:29 PT:
Well Said, Kegan.
Here's another voice that just doesn't get it:CN QU: Editorial: Nothing Medicinal About Judicial Marijuana http://www.mapinc.org/drugnews/v03/n1045/a08.html?397 11 Jul 2003 
Montreal Gazette Medical cannabis patients fight in the courts for their medical rights, under the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms. The federal government took away those rights 80 years ago without debate, without outcry of the media. Then, when the courts restore those rights, the media complain that the courts are making laws.ego transcendence follows ego destruction, wake up and live.
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Comment #13 posted by Kegan on July 12, 2003 at 02:59:57 PT
Maybe this plan is better
Health Canada knows NOTHING about cannabis.1) Are the seeds hybrid, indica or sativa?2) Since when is 10% THC a good level?3) 10%....? I need to smoke 8 grams a day or eat 14.4) What about the CBD's? I need a painkiller, but my epileptic roomate needs high THC levels.5) You don't take your TV to the best MUFFLER guy in town, so why go to a doctor for a medicine they know nothing about?6) Doctors risk licences by dispensing illegal material.Canada's Health care system is collapsing faster than the US economy.The way to fix this is easy:1) Declare prohibition dead in Canada. No one will go to jail for possession, cultivation, or trafficking, unless there are other circumsatnces (ie: heavy drugs, guns, etc.)
Pardon people in jail where appropriate.2) Officially recognize that the compassion clubs are THE guide to patient care and quality standards for medical cannabis.3) Implement a regulation program, where sick people, LICENCED compassionate growers, and compassion clubs are maybe tax exempt or "tax-releifed" or whatever....4) For those growing commerically, for the "coffee shops" and private use, tax it big. Reasonable, but still tax it. Like tobacco or alcohol.5) Growing pot at home and selling it to a friend or two would be subject to the same scrutiny and safety limits as home vegetable growing (can't sell commercially).6) Offices for licencing, a licence board, the works. Lots of jobs. 7) Save the BEEF induystry by growing cheap hemp food for cows (better for them) and if a beef farmer wants to move into industrial hemp.... fine. Help him out.8) Big Oil can go screw.This is too frigging easy to accomplish, and that is why the canadian government is balking.
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Comment #12 posted by CorvallisEric on July 11, 2003 at 23:13:33 PT
One more hempfest next week
Emerald Empire Hempfest - 
Saturday July 19, Alton Baker Park, Eugene OR 
http://www.emeraldempirehempfest.com/
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Comment #11 posted by FoM on July 11, 2003 at 20:03:27 PT
ekim
Thank you for all the great events information! I hope many get to go to one or more of them!
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Comment #10 posted by ekim on July 11, 2003 at 19:37:07 PT
Hemp industry events
www.thehia.org-------------------Santa Barbara Hemp Festival, 
July 12 - 13 - Santa Barbara, CA www.santabarbarahempco.comReggae on the River, 
August 1 - 3 French’s Camp, Piercy, CA 
http://www.reggaeontheriver.comAll Things Organic Festival, 
August 9 - 10
Mendocino Co, Fairgrounds, Boonville, CA 
707-895-3616HIA 10th Annual Convention, 
August 20-23
Pine Ridge Reservation, SD 
Click here to download a PDF info sheet
http://www.thehia.orgSeattle Hemp Fest, 
August 16 - 17 - Seattle, WA – http://www.seattlehempfest.comMAGIC
August 25 - 28 - Las Vegas, NV
www.magiconline.comYoga Expo
September 25 - 28
Los Angeles Convention Center
http://www.yogaexpo.comHemp Harvest Celebration 
September 27th 
Hempola Valley Farms - Barrie, Ontario
(800) 240-9215 
Wagon rides, guided interpretive trail through the hemp fields, musical concerts, arts and crafts, demonstrations and seminars, hemp straw home, hemp food village. http://www.hempola.comCHFA Expo East,
October 16 - 19 - Toronto, ON Canada http://www.chfa.ca 4th Hemp and Eco-Technologies Exhibition
November 7 - 9 • Paris, France
http://www.festival-du-chanvre.com
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Comment #9 posted by afterburner on July 11, 2003 at 19:35:29 PT:
Right On, SoberStoner.
The battle's not won. The battle's just begun. But now we can sense victory if we just stay the course."Freedom is not divisible, and when one man is enslaved, all are not free!" --JFK in Berlin.ego transcendence follows ego destruction, our compassion clubs are teaching Bush's conservatives the true meaning of compassionate. Now the politicians want to jump on our bandwagon.
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Comment #8 posted by SoberStoner on July 11, 2003 at 18:39:00 PT
Dont celebrate yet
The war on both fronts is still going on just as heavily as before..this is just poop that has been polished a bit. Only when the world recognizes that the rules are wrong and are changed can we celebrate.Even in a country that supposedly has 'legal' cannabis, you are put in a cage (think on THAT canada..your laws are gone, but parts of your legal system wont let it die)Dont think for a second that a failed amendment is a victory. But also do not take lightly the steps we have taken to acheive this point. Do NOT forget how people are still suffering at this very second..think of that person locked in a cage, away from everything he knows, afraid for his very life.Do you think they are celebrating some lazy, overpaid criminal in a suit saying "oh yeah..this is bad an stuff," in a plosh chair and who goes home to a half million dollar home they dont pay rent for, while they sit on a metal bench that also doubles as a bed in a cage that may be 8'x10'?We may finally have the critical support we need, but we are far from finished my friends. We will see many more battles to come, and hopefully we'll see a lot more positive news. While I do appreciate the efforts of some of the people in congress, we cannot just sit back and hope they will finish the job. We must keep pressing and pressing the issue until all of our brothers and sisters are free from cages and are able to enjoy cannabis freely wherever they may, without worrying about getting 'caught'.Peace and LoveSS
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Comment #7 posted by Virgil on July 11, 2003 at 17:59:08 PT
P.S.
They should use the things to limit the empty calories in sodas at the K-12 level and prescribe a limit on soda. Think of the children. Hell, if you are going to start real reform, don't forget to think of the goddamned children. Chant on that, you prohibitionists dope.
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Comment #6 posted by Virgil on July 11, 2003 at 17:42:32 PT
Pissing up a rope
"A Brandon doctor says he has no qualms about dispensing medicinal marijuana from his office I knew a loudmouth once that would call a dumb idea "pissing up a rope" as in "just pissing around." But anyway, try the best idea first. Cannabis is going to be legal and laying on the goddamn streets in Canada. If I were a rich brat I would by some property on this of Canada, and put up big targets so they could shoot some herbal parts across the border. Shoot some big stem with a parachuting payload. Hemp arrows with hemp molded features. Hemp arrows would probably be called WMD and we would have to drop some DU since we cannot get rid of the radioactivity fast enough for the neo-nuts nuclear bunker buster round of pollution and arms racing to nuclear winter in small steps.I call treason. "Drug War Trials" needs to start circulating. If too much of a good thing is too much, then what is to much of a terrible thing- like treason. Well, I digress. My suggestion is universal distribution with a magnetic card and a dispensing machine. Have it in the lobby along with cannabis foods, also available with your dispensing card. Have them at the grocery store for all I care. Wherever it sells, I guess. The only reason they should need a card is if the government is paying for it. Anyway, somebody needs to be working on the best way and quit this pissing up a rope.
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Comment #5 posted by afterburner on July 11, 2003 at 16:51:21 PT:
Thanks to All Activists.
cloud7's post from the MPP is a vindication of all the hard work you've done. We have helped the USA reach critical mass. We have made cannabis reform a major political issue. Keep up the great work!ego transcendence follows ego destruction, like a snowball rolling down the side of a snow-covered hill, it's growing.
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Comment #4 posted by FoM on July 11, 2003 at 16:40:20 PT
cloud7
Thank you. I really appreciate your posting the press release for us all to read.
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Comment #3 posted by cloud7 on July 11, 2003 at 16:36:22 PT
Letter from MPP
Just sent out, thought I'd post it:"Dear Friend:This is a busy time in the nation's capital. Congress is currently
considering a number of bills and a nomination related to marijuana
policy. As a result, the Marijuana Policy Project has sent many
requests for action to its e-mail subscribers. You will be pleased to
know that in this alert you will not be asked to do anything.The purpose of this alert is to describe a very encouraging event that
occurred in Congress this week. On Wednesday, the U.S. House Judiciary
Committee considered the Office of National Drug Control Policy
(ONDCP) Reauthorization Act of 2003. The Democrats on the committee
did not rubberstamp this bill; instead, they used the hearing as an
opportunity to attack not only the Bush administration's medical
marijuana policy, but also the war on drugs in its entirety.U.S. Rep. Jerrold Nadler (D-NY) pressed the medical marijuana issue.
First, he proposed an amendment that would have ended the drug czar's
practice of interfering in state efforts to pass medical marijuana
legislation. Then, he proposed another amendment that would have
prevented the drug czar from approving the budget of any agency that
used funds to arrest medical marijuana patients. All Democrats in
attendance supported the latter amendment. (There was not a roll call
vote on the first amendment.)More surprising was the vehemence with which the Democrats denounced
the war on drugs. The spark that lit the fuse for this explosion was
an amendment proposed by U.S. Rep. Maxine Waters (D-CA), which would
have deleted the entire reauthorization bill. Saying that the bill was
"not worth the paper it is printed on," Rep. Waters declared that
ONDCP is "wasteful, ineffective and unworthy." U.S. Rep. Melvin Watt
(D-NC) called the war on drugs a "dismal failure" and said that there
is nothing he is more embarrassed about than the federal government's
drug policy.Nadler and U.S. Rep. Sheila Jackson-Lee (D-TX) also had harsh words
for the war on drugs, while the committee's ranking member, U.S. Rep.
John Conyers (D-MI), decried the growing number of prisoners in this
country serving time for nonviolent drug offenses. In the end, 10 of
11 Democrats in attendance voted in favor of deleting the entire bill.The momentum for marijuana policy reform is clearly building. You can
almost feel the once-seemingly impenetrable wall of the war on drugs
starting to crumble. MPP is excited to be involved in this fight and
looks forward to keeping you posted about future developments.Sincerely,Steve Fox
Director of Government Relations
Marijuana Policy Project
Washington, D.C.P.S. Please visit http://www.mpp.org/USA/donate.html or write to
   MPP, P.O. Box 77492, Washington, D.C. 20013 to donate to our
   lobbying work on Capitol Hill."
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Comment #2 posted by afterburner on July 11, 2003 at 16:27:08 PT:
Canada's Diversified Health Care System Delivers
Thank God that Canada has a diversified health care system including naturopaths, like Dr. Paul Conyette, acupuncture and acupressure massage, massage therapy, herbalists, homeopathy, chiropractors, osteopaths, as well as the physicians and surgeons of the CMA (Canadian Medical Association), who like the AMA (American Medical Association) in the USA have a vested interest in pharmaceuticals and tend to resist herbs and other alternative treatments. As long as there are willing health care practitioners who support patients' rights to supervised self-determination, Canada will make progress in health care.ego transcendence follows ego destruction, the courts and some doctors support the patient's right to medical self-determination.
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Comment #1 posted by FoM on July 11, 2003 at 15:26:29 PT
Canadians for Safe Access Press Conference 
OPN: Canadians for Safe Access Press Conference July 9th, 2003 - Parliament Hill 
    
 Canadians for Safe Access: http://www.safeaccess.ca/ held a press conference July 9th on Parliament Hill about the medical cannabis announcement made by Health Canada.Philippe Lucas opened the conference with the announcement below. Also participating were Bloc MP Real Menard, NDP MP Libby Davies, Senator Claude Nolin, Alison Myrden, Dom Cramer and Boris St-Maurice. A brisk question and answer session with the media followed the short statements of each of the participants.The entire conference, in three parts, is currently on line as video files. 
Video Link: http://www.epress.ca/index-en.asp?whowhere=epress
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