MINISTER'S DISCOMFORT VS. AGONY OF PATIENTS

Toronto lawyer Alan Young has the picture right: Anne Mclellan, Canada's
health minister, is either 'confused, or she's being disingenuous,'
relating her discomfort with allowing people with epilepsy, terminal
cancer, or chronic pain legal access to marijuana.

When you consider the group to whom McLellan shared her discomfort -- the
Canadian medical establishment -- you could include doctors in the group of
confused and disingenuous.

McLellan's comments may be increasing the pain of people suffering from
incurable and agonizing diseases -- all for the comfort and profit of drug
companies and doctors who are paid to prescribe ever more expensive (and
debatably less effective) relief.

First is the issue of the law. Mclellan should know -- she used to be the
federal justice minister, after all -- that the courts have roundly struck
down pot possession laws for people who use marijuana for medicinal
purposes. Courts in Ontario and Alberta have repeated that they will not
enforce laws that place people in agony.

In fact, the current situation in law stems from the federal government
being given a court deadline to either change possession laws for people
using marijuana for medical relief of pain and suffering, or the courts
would simply cease to enforce any part of the laws restricting use of
marijuana. They were given 12 months to act and they did.

Thus, the next point: the government has a $5.7-million project to grow and
distribute marijuana to select patients for the next four years.

Enter the doctors. Their national association has told its members not to
sign any formal patient requests to receive any of the 400 kg of medicinal
pot the federal government is having grown each year for four years
specifically for this use.

Just the same, more than 800 patients have qualified under the government's
rules for the special program. However, it's now doubtful any of them will,
due to the medical association's pressure and Mclellan's personal discomfort.

Imagine this: some of them are now turning to the courts to force the
uncomfortable McLellan to release the drug to them.

Too bad her discomfort counts for more than the agony of someone who has
multiple epileptic seizures every day and for whom marijuana offers the
only relief available. Or the suffering of someone dying of cancer, for
whom only marijuana will give relief from the horrific effects of chemotherapy.

Mclellan, the person in charge of the government's anti-tobacco campaign,
doesn't want to send the message that a person with liver cancer, say,
should be confused by a message that it's OK to smoke. What a big, fat,
stinking red herring.

The doctors say they don't want to risk lawsuits for prescribing an
untested drug. Yet untested drugs are given all the time to patients in
dire straits, who knowingly sign the appropriate releases. And these
untested drugs and procedures don't have near the overwhelming weight of
anecdotal evidence of efficacy that marijuana has.

Unfortunately, what marijuana doesn't have is profit potential for drug
companies.

Therein lies the biggest rub of all.

It is impossible not to deduce that since the federal grow program began,
as a result of the courts telling the government their laws stink and they
won't enforce them anymore, that a massive lobbying campaign of pressure on
doctors and the government is causing some 'sober' second thoughts.

We're not urging people to seek relief in illegal sources of marijuana.
That would be disrespect for the law, disrespect for doctors and disrespect
for the federal government -- all of which are leaving a small group of
vulnerable people at the extreme edge of suffering.

We wouldn't do that. They'll have to think of ways to do that themselves,
and invite yet more court intervention. Pity.

This editorial originally appeared in The Red Deer (Alberta) Advocate
and was made available to The Beacon Herald through the Canadian Press
editorial exchange.