IT'S OFFICIAL: HASH HAS HEALING POWER

Cannabis To Be Legalised For Sufferers Of Crippling Diseases

CANNABIS is to be legalised for people who take it to ease the pain of
crippling diseases.

It was claimed yesterday that the Government will accept the findings of a
study - expected to recommend pot to be decriminalised for sufferers of
conditions such as multiple sclerosis.

Prime Minister Tony Blair, Home Secretary Jack Straw and drugs policy
co-ordinator Mo Mowlam are said to have struck a deal on cannabis.

Sources claim that Mowlam has dropped her demand for a Royal Commission on
cannabis legalisation in return for Blair and Straw agreeing to make it
legal for people needing relief from pain.

An official three-year research project now under way is expected to
validate the drug's use for medical purposes.

Downing Street yesterday insisted no decision had been made ahead of the
research findings.

But sources said it would be virtually impossible not to legalise cannabis
for medical uses if the research says it can help.

Cannabis is smoked widely by sufferers of multiple sclerosis, cancer and
arthritis who are currently breaking the law.

However, courts are growing increasingly reluctant to punish medical users
caught in possession.

And several police chiefs, including two Scots chief constables, have called
for its medical use to be legalised.

Even the Government-backed Scotland Against Drugs campaign supports
decriminalisation for its use in illnesses.

Mowlam's spokeswoman said: "The Minister has said before that this issue
will have to be looked at if the research finds that cannabis helps - and
that there are no side-effects."

The clamour for cannabis legalisation for medical purposes was fuelled in
November 1988 when the House of Lords science committee said doctors should
be allowed to prescribe it.

Now human trials are under way in a pounds 900,000 programme authorised by
the Government's Medical Research Agency.

MS patients are being given extract of cannabis known as
tetrahydrocannabinol, used in the UK for over 30 years to treat nausea in
cancer patients. Tests on muscle stiffness and mobility will be made every
few weeks on the sufferers to measure exactly what help cannabis offers.

Last night, Alistair Ramsay, of Scotland Against Drugs, said: "We take the
same line as the House of Lords.

"If there are conditions where cannabis is shown to help, then we support
its decriminalisation for those purposes.

"We would prefer to see it in a non-smokable form and it doesn't alter our
opposition to its use for recreational purposes.

"But if it can be shown to have a use for people in pain then we would not
want to deny them that."

A spokesman for the MS society said last night: "We have never supported the
criminalisation of MS sufferers who use cannabis and have called on the
courts to treat people prosecuted for it with understanding.

"What we know from anecdotal evidence is that many MS sufferers say cannabis
gives them relief from pain which is not available anywhere else."

But some anti-drugs groups believe the legalisation of pot for medical
purposes would open the door to a full-scale decriminalisation.

Glasgow-based anti-drugs campaigner Maxie Richards insisted: "There is no
actual proof that cannabis has any beneficial effect on MS suffers not
available from prescription drugs.

"If we were to legalise its use even for limited use, it would send out
entirely the wrong signal to young people that it was acceptable to dabble
in drugs.

"Young people need to be protected. Ninety-eight per cent of the heroin
addicts who approach me for help say they started on cannabis. That tells
its own story."

Queen Victoria was reputed to use cannabis to relieve period pain.

But research on the claims of its beneficial health effects has always been
hampered by the fact that the very possession of it is was illegal.

The issue will return to the political agenda next week when the Police
Foundation publish the results of a two-year study into drugs laws.

The report has been widely tipped to recommend that people no longer be
jailed for possessing cannabis for medical use.

In 1998, Fife Chief Constable John Hamilton said GPs should be able to
prescribe pot for MS sufferers.

Last December, Central Scotland Police Chief Constable William Wilson said:
"I'm convinced cannabis can bring relief to people suffering from illnesses
like MS."