PATIENTS CALL FOR 'DOPE'

The Government has been accused of forcing sick people and their carers
into crime by stalling the legalisation of cannabis for medicinal use.

This week a 68-year-old Waimate caregiver told the Timaru District Court
she had grown 80 cannabis plants in her in her garden to relieve her
husband's pain after he suffered a stroke.

Police searching her house also found 13 loaves and two small cakes
containing cannabis butter.

It was the first time Dawn Sarah Willis had appeared in a court. She was
sentenced to 100 hours' community work by Judge Edward Ryan.

Last year a health select committee report recommended the Government
investigate the prescription of clinically tested cannabis products for
medicinal use.

Yesterday David Buckle, a spokesman for Health Ministry medicines watchdog
Medsafe, said it was still waiting for a cannabis-based spray product,
Sativex, to be licensed in Britain later this year before it could be
introduced in New Zealand.

He said smoking cannabis for medical reasons would never be approved
because smoking was damaging to health.

Green MP Nandor Tanzcos said that while the Government delayed the
introduction of cannabis-based medicines, innocent people were being forced
into illegal and dangerous activities.

"The problem people face now is that if the acquire cannabis illegally
they're putting themselves at risk of violence or intimidation.

"If they grow it themselves, they' re at risk of getting arrested, going to
court and getting a criminal record. There are thousands of New Zealanders
using cannabis to treat medical conditions in this way."

Buckle said 15 doctors had applied under the 1975 Misuse of Drugs Act for
special approval from the Health Minister to prescribe cannabis for a
patient under their care.

However, none had been approved because cannabis was not available here in
an "appropriate medicinal form".

There is some international evidence that people suffering the effects of
chemotherapy, HIV medication, multiple sclerosis and spinal injuries can
benefit from cannabis' pain-relieving, anti-spasmodic and anti-nausea
qualities.

Doctors in the Netherlands are allowed to prescribe cannabis to patients
suffering a variety of ailments, including multiple sclerosis, Aids and cancer.

The Green Party published a survey last year showing that a third of New
Zealand doctors poled would consider cannabis if it was legal, and one in
five had patients they knew were using cannabis medicinally.

New Zealand Medical Association Tricia Briscoe said it supported research
into the benefits of cannabis for medical use.