CANNABIS PIONEER CHOKED BY RED TAPE

MEDICINAL cannabis pioneer Tony Bower says he is fed up with
bureaucratic stonewalling in NSW and will move his increasingly
popular dispensary to Queensland.

Mr Bower founded Mullaway's Medical Cannabis after developing a way to
access the healing qualities of cannabis without the notorious side-
effects, offering welcome relief to people suffering chronic pain and
terminal illness.

Hundreds, possibly thousands, of people on the NSW North Coast who
previously struggled with the often debilitating side-effects of
prescription painkillers have attributed significant relief from
chronic pain and improvement in quality of life to Mr Bower and his
medicines.

"There are so many sick people relying on me to provide these
medicines (but) after two years of attempting to negotiate with the
NSW Government, a way forward needs to be found for terminally and
chronically ill patients to have access to a safe, effective,
inexpensive, natural and legal medicine," he said in a statement.

"For 12 months I have had approval from the Therapeutic Goods
Administration to proceed, and my consultants have since been waiting
on the NSW Government."

Mr Bower has been operating his fast-growing mobile dispensary between
Port Macquarie and Nimbin for two years, but can no longer keep up
with demand.

He has decided to apply to operate in Queensland, where he believes a
$5.2 million medical extraction facility could be built.

"This facility needs to be built soon, the need is pressing, and it
could easily employ up to a 100 people within two years," he said.

"I apologise to the people of the Kempsey-Port Macquarie and Nimbin
areas, but hope they will understand that any decision to try to
establish elsewhere is for the sake of the people who are suffering
now - their situations cannot wait for political delays."

Following a serious motorcycle accident 30 years ago, Mr Bower
developed a method to distil a stable tincture capable of providing
effective relief for sufferers of chronic pain.

He has since successfully treated sufferers of cancer, AIDS, multiple
sclerosis, glaucoma, arthritis, mig-raines and a host of other
illnesses. A form of pharmaceutical cannabis called Marinol is
available under strict conditions.