Pubdate: Tue, 19 Aug 2014
Source: National Post (Canada)
Copyright: 2014 Canwest Publishing Inc.
Contact: http://drugsense.org/url/wEtbT4yU
Website: http://www.nationalpost.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/286
Author: Sharon Kirkey
Page: A8

HEALTH CANADA DOESN'T ENDORSE MEDICAL USE OF POT, AMBROSE SAYS

Health Minister Defends Proposed Anti-Pot Ads

Doctors should not feel obliged to prescribe marijuana to patients 
seeking it for pain relief or other medical purposes, says the 
federal health minister.

"Health Canada does not endorse the use of marijuana, nor is it an 
approved drug in this country, nor has it gone through any of the 
clinical trials that other pharmaceutical products that are approved 
in this country have gone through," Rona Ambrose said Monday after 
her opening address to the Canadian Medical Association's annual 
general meeting in Ottawa.

"The majority of the physician community do not want to prescribe it, 
they don't want to be put in a situation where they're pressured to 
prescribe it and I encourage them to not prescribe it if they're not 
comfortable with it."

The Canadian Medical Association (CMA) says doctors have been thrust 
into an "untenable" position by being made the sole gatekeepers to 
legal pot. Outgoing president Dr. Louis Hugo Francescutti recently 
suggested people who ask for the drug in a doctor's office are just 
looking for "dope."

Ms. Ambrose said while she is sympathetic with doctors' concerns, "I 
don't think there is anyone better to make that decision than a 
physician with their patient."

When "mid-level bureaucrats" at Health Canada, not doctors, were the 
ultimate arbiters in approving or rejecting applications to possess 
marijuana for medical purposes, "the average authorization was 
between 54 to 90 joints a day - much beyond what is recognized 
internationally in any way as an acceptable amount."

Since the new regime was implemented and oversight tightened over who 
is approving marijuana for medical reasons - and how much - the 
average amount of pot authorized by a doctor has fallen from 17 grams 
a day to four grams a a patient would use per day."

Ms. Ambrose also defended a controversial, taxpayer-funded anti-pot 
campaign that had become a politically charged issue on Canada's 
marijuana policy. Health Canada has asked the CMA and two other 
doctors' groups to lend their logos to the ad campaign warning youth 
against the dangers of marijuana.

But, in a rare joint statement issued Saturday, the CMA, the College 
of Family Physicians of Canada and the Royal College of Physicians & 
Surgeons of Canada said they would decline the government's 
invitation, saying the issue had become a "political football" in the 
debate over the legal status of the drug.

With an estimated budget of $5-million, the ad campaign would not 
have directly targeted Liberal leader Justin Trudeau's support for 
the legalization and regulation of reported on the campaign last 
week, Mr. Trudeau called it a thinly veiled partisan attack against 
him, paid for with tax dollars.

Ms. Ambrose rejected the charge.

"Let me be clear: Telling kids to not smoke pot is not a partisan 
attack on Justin Trudeau by Health Canada," she said.

"It is a sound public health policy backed by science. Whether pot is 
legal or illegal, the health risks of marijuana to youth remain the 
same and we should all be concerned about them."

The minister said she has asked the doctors' groups "to work together 
to continue to warn young people about the health risks of smoking marijuana."

"Telling kids to not smoke marijuana is not politics. It is good 
public health policy and it is based in science, and we agree on this issue."
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