FEDERAL HEALTH MINISTER ALLAN ROCK TO TOUR MANITOBA MARIJUANA MINE

Riddle me this. What lives down a deep mineshaft beneath the cold
waters of a northern Manitoba lake, is bigger than three football
fields and is under tighter security than the Ebola virus yet
produces something you can buy on any street corner in Canada?

It's the first federal marijuana growing operation, which Health
Minister Allan Rock will inspect in Flin Flon, Man., this week. The
Cannabis Medical Access Project was set up to produce a supply of pot
under Ottawa's controversial medicinal marijuana policy.

If all goes well, specially trained technicians will begin harvesting
185 kilograms of the underground weed starting next month, said
Health Canada spokeswoman Cindy Cripps-Prawak from Ottawa.

By next February, selected patients suffering illnesses such as AIDS
should be able to light up federally tested pre-rolled joints to ease
their pain.

Those who eschew smoking will be given loose marijuana.

"Some medical marijuana users wish to use it for tea or cook it into
some food product," she said." Not everyone wants to smoke."

However, most of the initial batch will be used for research.

So far, 292 people have been approved to receive federal pot. More
than 500 other applications are being processed and more applications
are expected, she said.

Security at the grow operation is right out of a James Bond movie.

Visitors must wear special clothes and pass security checkpoints
before they can take the 25-minute plunge in a special transport
vehicle through 1,000 metres of granite into the bowels of the mine
located under Trout Lake.

The federal government has given the Flin Flon operation a level 7
security classification. That is three grades higher than the federal
lab in Winnipeg that handles lethal diseases such as the Ebola virus.

Pot proponents such as Steven Wishnia, senior editor of High Times
Magazine, chuckled at the security precautions. They show that
marijuana really does make some people paranoid, he joked.

"That is absolutely absurd," he said in an interview from New York City.

"If you smoke pot, your blood vessels aren't going to burst (a
symptom of Ebola). You are not going to bleed to death internally."

Canadian pot crusader Grant Krieger also scoffed at security at the
mine, especially in light of the medicinal strength of the pot it
will produce.

The federal government hopes to produce marijuana with an active THC
content of five to six per cent. Krieger said most Canadians can buy
much stronger pot in their own communities.

"No one is going to break into the mine for a six per cent plant," he
said from Calgary. "Just about anyone you bump into in the street
sells pot with a strength of about 15 to 18 per cent, maybe higher."

THC is short for tetrahydrocannabinol, which measures the potency of the drug.

Brent Zettl, president of Prairie Plant Systems, the company that
operates the grow operation on behalf of Ottawa, acknowledged
security is a little over the top.

His employees try to keep things light by cracking jokes about the
underground mine and remembering their roots.

The company won the five-year, $5.75 million pot contract based
partly on its successful experience growing Saskatoon berry trees and
roses.

"We call it the rock garden," Zettl chuckled. "We are going to put a
sign over the door."

Other people in the community, located 600 kilometres northwest of
Winnipeg, are also laughing - all the way to the bank.

Chris Pilz, owner of a novelty store called the Zig Zag Zone, wants
to make sure Flin Flon is known for much more than the birthplace of
NHL great Bob Clark, trout fishing and mosquitoes.

He has already sold more than 6,000 t-shirts emblazoned with the
slogan Flin Flon - Marijuana Growing Capital of Canada.

"Business is booming," he said. "We are very happy."