FEDS TO TIGHTEN RULES ON MEDICAL POT

Growing in Homes a Big Concern

Canada's medical marijuana licensing system is vulnerable to abuse and
needs to be tightened up, says the health minister after data emerged
this week revealing a surge in possibly fraudulent applications.

"We're aware that there are opportunities and risks of the system
being abused, which is why we are working to tighten up the system,"
said Steve Outhouse, a spokesman for Health Minister Leona Aglukkaq.

Outhouse was speaking in response to a recent Postmedia series looking
at medical marijuana licensing and use in Canada. The series was based
on electronic data the Ottawa Citizen obtained from Health Canada
through the Access to Information Act.

The figures showed, for example, that between 2008 and 2010
applications to Health Canada for medical marijuana based on severe
arthritis claims jumped 2,400 per cent.

There are two main changes Aglukkaq has proposed to prevent
exploitation of the government's Marihuana Medical Access Regulations,
said Outhouse.

They include better educating doctors on how to prescribe medical
marijuana and eliminating the right of patients to be granted a
licence to grow in their homes, he said.

"We want to be able to get more information out to doctors . . .
because often doctors don't have all the information they need to make
an informed decision as to whether or not to prescribe," Outhouse said.

"The other thing . . . we're proposing is that people wouldn't grow in
homes. That it would be available through a centralized location,
whatever company would grow it, to treat it as much as any other drug."

Outhouse said the health minister is concerned about the safety risks
involved with allowing people to grow marijuana plants in their home.

He said it's also difficult to regulate plant growth in homes, and
there is a risk of people growing more marijuana than they are allowed.

"If we can reduce and eliminate that at the home level, then I think a
lot of these issues will be dealt with."

However, under the proposed changes, Health Canada wants to remove
itself as the ultimate arbiter in approving or rejecting applications
to possess marijuana for medical reasons.

Instead, doctors alone would sign off on requests.

The Canadian Medical Association has said the proposals would put even
greater pressure on doctors to control access to a largely untested
and unregulated substance, a drug that hasn't gone through the normal
regulatory review process. Their licensing bodies have told doctors
that they are under no obligation to complete a medical declaration
under the current regulations and that anyone who chooses to do so
should "proceed with caution."

The CMA fears that the changes being proposed would essentially
off-load all responsibility for using and monitoring marijuana to the
doctors who signs an authorization.