DOCTORS TOLD TO REDUCE DOSAGE OF MARIJUANA PRESCRIPTIONS

OTTAWA -- Health Canada has been contacting doctors who prescribe
medical marijuana for their government-approved patients, advising
them to keep the dosages low.

Some users say that not only violates doctor-patient confidentiality,
it's also wrong for bureaucrats to make judgments about the medical
needs of people they've never seen.

"A person's medication should be between him and his doctor," said
Tony Adams, 60, a medical marijuana user in Victoria. "There shouldn't
be some bureaucrat in Ottawa that's never met me.

"Everybody has different needs for medications."

Adams, a licensed user who's been smoking seven grams of marijuana
daily, recently applied to Health Canada to increase the dose to 10
grams, with his doctor's authorization. Official approval from Ottawa
is needed so that Adam can legally grow the appropriate number of
marijuana plants, set by Health Canada at five plants for each daily
gram.

But a program official in Ottawa challenged Adams' doctor in a
telephone call, saying most patients need no more than five grams.
Adams, who has severe arthritis and degenerative disc disease, later
received a new licence for just five grams a day.

Similarly, Alison Myrden in Burlington, Ont., says her doctor was
challenged by Health Canada bureaucrats about her 20- to 28-gram daily
dose.

"They asked to lower it more than once, and my doctor and I both refused,"
said Myrden, 43, who uses marijuana for multiple sclerosis and another
painful condition. Her message to Health Canada: "Back off -- leave our
doctors alone."