Pubdate: Tue, 28 Jul 2015
Source: Jerusalem Post (Israel)
Copyright: 2015 The Jerusalem Post
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Website: http://www.jpost.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/516
Author: Judy Siegel

MEDICAL CANNABIS TO BE AVAILABLE AT DRUGSTORES

The Health Ministry will make it possible for patients licensed to 
receive medical cannabis to get it at a pharmacy, Deputy Health 
Minister MK Ya'acov Litzman announced on Monday at a session of the 
Knesset Committee on Drug and Alcohol Abuse.

The policy shift will make it easier for tens of thousands of people 
with pain and other chronic symptoms to get medical marijuana.

"I saw medical marijuana last week for the first time," said Litzman, 
an MK from the ultra-Orthodox United Torah Judaism Party. I was 
required by a suit in the High Court of Justice to deal with the 
issue," he said, adding that during his first four-year tenure as 
deputy health ministry, he "tried to stay away from dealing with the 
issue myself, but to hand it to professionals in the ministry. I am 
aware of the need to create order in the matter and to change the 
ministry's policy to make it easier for patients," the UTJ MK said.

Litzman said the ministry intends to train senior medial specialists 
who will be listed as experts in medical cannabis. "Every change 
takes time, and the moment we finish the legal process regarding the 
High Court case, we will act to advance the change."

Legislation will be prepared to carry out the directives.

Committee chairman MK Tamar Zandberg called Litzman's turnabout "a 
real revolution. Under the present situation, there was a bottleneck 
that caused many patients to suffer from the red tape and delays. We 
are in fact canceling the administrative discretion and shifting to 
medical considerations," the MK said.

Ministry associate director-general Dr. Boaz Lev added that "part of 
the change we will create will be standardization so that obtaining 
medical cannabis will be very much like getting a prescription drug 
in the pharmacy.

One of our aims is to open the bureaucratic bottleneck so that more 
physicians can prescribe it, with all the necessary responsibility 
and care," Lev said.

The ministry will train a list of senior physicians and the patients 
themselves so they will know all of the dangers, he said. "We want to 
see it as the process closest to obtaining other narcotics." The 
ministry has added new indications for medical cannabis, "and in this 
field, we are among the most advanced in the world. The authorization 
will be renewed once a year," the director-general said.

MK Yinon Magal (Bayit Yehudi) said it was impossible to "always claim 
there is a risk of cannabis leaking out to people unauthorized to get 
it. One could claim that about any other drug."

Zionist Union MK Shelly Yacimovich - who does not often praise 
Litzman's ultra-Orthdox party  said that the decision was an 
"incredible advance, a 180-degree turnaround for the ministry." She 
added, however, that "Boldness, determination and executive ability 
is required," to implement the reforms.

Hagai Hillman, chairman of the forum of legal growers of medical 
cannabis, welcomed the decision to make the drug more accessible. "In 
the coming days, we will study the decision and offer our suggestions 
of the best way to ensure that patients continue to receive a 
high-quality product at a reasonable price with a minimum of red tape 
and middleman's fees," he said.

The ministry said it aims to standardize supplies of medical cannabis 
so they are available as generic products.

This will allow physicians to prescribe the proper dosage.
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MAP posted-by: Jay Bergstrom