Pubdate: Thu, 28 Jan 2016
Source: Globe and Mail (Canada)
Copyright: 2016 The Globe and Mail Company
Contact:  http://www.theglobeandmail.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/168
Author: Mike Hager
Page: S1

LICENSED POT OIL TOO SCARCE, EXPENSIVE FOR MEDICAL USERS

Health Canada is in process of approving applications for another 11
growers, up from three

Every two months, Chris Skidmore crushes about half a kilogram of
dried marijuana, soaks it in isopropyl alcohol, then strains the
liquid through a coffee filter and into a rice cooker to burn off the
remaining fumes - creating his own cannabis oil. He swallows a few
drops of the oil every morning before breakfast, along with a cocktail
of vitamin, fish oil and glucosamine chondroitin pills, to treat his
HIV symptoms.

Mr. Skidmore said he was diagnosed with HIV a decade ago and soon
turned to medical marijuana, but he gave up smoking the drug about
five years later, switching to oils because they didn't leave him congested.

"When I started eating it, a whole bunch of things stopped; I could
breathe again and I didn't get my sinus problem any more," said Mr.
Skidmore, an entrepreneur who lives in Port Coquitlam and makes
greenhouses for licensed marijuana growers.

The federal medical marijuana program, which allows licensed growers
to sell pot through the mail, was initially restricted to dried pot,
but a Supreme Court of Canada ruling last year cleared the way for
access to ingestible forms of the drug.

However, while most producers are able to produce oil, only three have
been given the green light to sell it. And what little product is
available has sold out quickly, making it difficult for patients to
access it.

Health Canada said it's too early to provide stats on how much oil has
been sold by the three producers that can legally sell oils. A
spokesman said in an e-mailed statement that the department is in the
process of scheduling and conducting further inspections to approve
applications for another 11 growers.

Mr. Skidmore, a cannabis advocate for several years, says he can't
afford the cannabis oil sold by a handful of Canada's licensed
commercial producers, and every patient he knows buys their oil from
illegal dispensaries or small-scale producers such as himself.

Using marijuana he grows with a licence under the old federal medical
marijuana system, the material in each batch costs him about $ 100,
which he says works out to an overall cost of about $ 5 to $ 10 per
gram of oil, depending on how the process goes. That's much cheaper
than the $ 25 to $ 50 per gram at Vancouver's dispensaries, or the $
90 charged by one licensed producer, Mettrum, for one 40- millilitre
bottle of oil, the cheapest rate offered through Health Canada's system.

On Wednesday afternoon, that producer released three varieties of oils
to patients. At a limit of one bottle per customer, two of the three
types had sold out by Thursday afternoon, with the last 30 or so
remaining bottles expected to sell out that evening, according to a
sales representative.

Many licensed growers are anxious to begin selling since last year's
Supreme Court decision. Some had previously complained about only
being able to sell dried marijuana. At the same time, they are
competing with illegal dispensaries, which are popping up across the
country and can offer face-to-face sales and a variety of products,
including oils.

Dispensaries also don't abide by the stringent guidelines on THC
concentration and viscosity that licensed producers must meet.

Brent Zettl, CEO of licensed producer CanniMed, said his company has
filled about 1,000 orders since it was approved to sell the oils about
two weeks ago and has much more stock available. He said the process
of creating concentrated oils has proven trying for many producers and
the bureaucrats tasked with ensuring these products are safe.

Meanwhile, he says the long delays in approvals "frustrates patients,
for sure."

M. J. Milloy, an infectious-disease epidemiologist who is studying
the therapeutic effects of marijuana at the B. C. Centre for
Excellence in HIV/ AIDS, said these oils appeal to patients who might
not normally consider using cannabis. That's because oils offer clear
and repeatable dosages, compositions that can greatly reduce the
psychoactive effects and the ability to eat - not smoke or vaporize -
their medicine, he said.

"To be honest, the stigma around smoked herbal marijuana still
probably puts a lot of people off," Dr. Milloy said. "When it's
presented in more of a medical package, I think there are more people
out there who might consider it."

Medical-marijuana patients have provided myriad anecdotal evidence
that the drug helps them with a variety of ailments, from chronic
nerve pain to arthritis, but clinical trials proving its efficacy on
many conditions are still lacking, Dr. Milloy said.

Before last fall's federal election, his colleagues at the centre
wrote an editorial in the Canadian Journal of Public Health calling on
doctors to stop prescribing frequently abused opioids to those with
chronic pain, in favour of cannabis. Dr. Thomas Kerr said medical pot
has also been proven to relieve spasticity and "wasting" associated
with HIV/ AIDS, as well as nausea and vomiting caused by
chemotherapy.

In the Supreme Court ruling last summer that enshrined a patient's
right to buy edible forms of the medicine - such as cannabis oils -
from federally licensed growers, judges also accepted that cannabis
has anti-inflammatory and anti-spasmodic properties.