Multiple Sclerosis

POT CRUSADER URGED TO EDUCATE PHYSICIANS

A Calgary man who is organizing a non-profit club to help seriously
ill people obtain marijuana for medicinal purposes should work at
educating physicians about the drug's benefits, advises a Vancouver
activist.

And he should ensure that as many of the club's members as possible
obtain written recommendations from their doctors in favour of the
illicit drug, Hilary Brown (sic) of Vancouver's Compassion Club said
Tuesday.

`Communications with local police would be the best bet,' Brown said,
explaining that unofficial contact fosters mutual understanding and
may be why police in Vancouver have tolerated her operation.

Brown was reacting to news that Calgarian Grant Krieger, a multiple
sclerosis patient and crusader for the medicinal use of pot, intends
to launch a Compassion club in the next two months.

Whatever Krieger does, he should do it in a way that is not seen to be
sneaky, said Brown, who opened her 800-member club in May 1997 and
supplies her members the dope by mail.

`Everything needs to be above board.'

Krieger, diagnosed with multiple sclerosis 20 years ago, said he began
using marijuana to alleviate muscle spasms four years ago and is able
to lead a near-normal existence, although he remains disabled and
dependent on Canada Pension Plan income.

He plans to provide members of his club with locally grown
dope.

Krieger is promoting the drug despite two trafficking convictions this
year - one in Calgary and the other in Regina, where he is to be
sentenced in January.

Not everyone shares Krieger's enthusiasm over the medicinal value of
cannabis.

Dr. Ted Braun, a palliative care physician at Rockyview Hospital, said
little or no credible research has been done and he has never
encountered a patient who told him cannabis has a therapeutic effect
where other drugs failed.

Dr. Bill Grisdale, medical director of Hospice Calgary and a pain
expert, said his pot-smoking patients had an addiction history before
contracting their disease.

Grisdale said he has tried helping cancer patients afflicted with
nausea by prescribing a tablet that consists partly of cannabis, but
`I'm not impressed that is's good.

`I can't recall anybody saying that it (marijuana) has specifically
helped their pain,' he said.

But Boston psychiatrist Lester Grinspoon, a professor at Harvard Medical
School and co-author of the 1993 book Marijuana: The Forbidden Medicine,
predicted the drug eventually will be seen `as an extraordinary medicine.'

Grinspoon said the book is based on research in scientific journals
and volumes of anecdotal material.

`It is remarkably non-toxic,' he said.

`It is useful in the treatment of a very diverse array of symptoms and
syndromes.

`The drug companies are not the least bit interested in cannabis.
They can't patent it.'

Compassion Clubs have sprouted up in the past two years across Canada
and the United States as a way for activists to pressure legislators
to legalize marijuana.

Alaska, Arizona, Nevada, Oregon and Washington approved marijuana for
medicinal purposes Nov. 3 despite a U.S. federal ban on the drug.
Federal authorities have threatened to strip physicians of their
prescription authority if they are caught prescribing dope.

But proponents say doctors will not be prosecuted in states with the
new laws as long as the simply recommend pot and don't prescribe or
procure it.

Checked-by: Patrick Henry