7/11/ was not a lucky day for California cannabis consumers. The morning papers described a Bush Administration challenge to the ruling (in Conant v. McCaffrey) that confirmed the right of doctors to discuss marijuana with their patients. San Francisco AIDS specialist Marcus Conant, MD, and co-plaintiffs had sought such confirmation in January, 1997, after the Drug Czar, on behalf of the Clinton Administration, threatened to revoke the prescription-writing licenses of any California doctors who approved cannabis use. Federal Judge Fern Smith (a Reagan appointee!) temporarily enjoined the feds (on First Amendment grounds!) from carrying out or repeating this threat. Then Judge William Alsup made the injunction permanent and the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals upheld his ruling. Now Bush's lawyers are asking the U.S. Supreme Court to overturn it. [continues 1797 words]
No Permanent Regulations in Place OTTAWA - Health Canada is getting into the business of selling marijuana to the sick, even while police continue to bust people for growing or dealing the drug illegally. Under an interim policy announced Wednesday, the government will sell bags of marijuana seeds and dried marijuana to sick patients who qualify under Ottawa's medical pot program. The announcement came on the day an Ontario court judge set as the deadline for the federal government to come up with regulations for distributing medical marijuana. [continues 408 words]
Toronto - The Canadian government announced an interim plan today that will provide marijuana on a regular basis to several hundred people who are authorized to use the drug for medical reasons. Coming six weeks after the federal government introduced a bill decriminalizing possession of small amounts of marijuana and only days after it approved a trial "safe injection site" in Vancouver for intravenous drug users, the marijuana plan was one more sign that Ottawa is moving in a very different direction on drug policy from the Bush administration. [continues 360 words]
OTTAWA (Reuters) - Canada became on Wednesday the first country in the world to start selling marijuana to several hundred seriously ill people but said the pot project could be halted at any time. Ottawa announced in July 2001 that some patients would be able to use marijuana provided by the government. But plans to grow official pot hit a series of snags, prompting a court in Ontario to give Ottawa until July 10 to come up with a solution. The new plan is Ottawa's response to that ruling. Federal officials said more research into the claimed benefits of medical pot was needed and they would therefore appeal the court ruling, a decision that angered critics. [continues 334 words]
Former Londoner Marc Emery Leads the Charge for New Pot Legislation. TORONTO -- Dozens of green-wearing, pot-smoking revellers partied outside Toronto's downtown police headquarters yesterday, smoking their joints, bongs and pipes without being harassed by a single police officer. Streams of sweet smoke wafted through the air as cannabis crusader Marc Emery, a Vancouver resident formerly from London, handed out joints to fellow pot enthusiasts and urged them to exercise "the lawful right to possess marijuana." "Marijuana is legal in Ontario to possess and it is permissible under law to smoke marijuana anywhere it is permissible to smoke tobacco in Ontario," Emery said. [continues 415 words]
I am a federal medical marijuana exemptee here in Canada and am appalled at the recent story in the Ottawa Sun regarding the medical marijuana Brent Zettl is growing in Manitoba being too strong. I will reiterate what I wrote to Health Minister Anne McLellan and the woman who runs the Medical Marijuana Program in Canada, Cindy Cripps-Prawak: As chronic pain sufferers, we already require much more medicine than the average citizen, let alone one who is battling a life-ending illness as well. [continues 172 words]
Ontario User Says Its Possible To Claim Weed On Income Tax An Ontario medical marijuana smoker has some good news for sick Nova Scotians who want to claim their pot as a medical expense on their income tax returns. "It's not a problem," Alison Myrden said in an interview Wednesday from her Burlington home. "We've been doing this for the past few years." The 38-year old former corrections officer was one of the first Canadians to successfully claim the cost of her marijuana as a legitimate medication for her multiple sclerosis. [continues 625 words]
Former leader in medical-pot movement now example of laws' cruel deficiencies Alison Myrden can barely speak. She squints against the thin light from her window on a winter afternoon and slumps unconscious on her bed in the middle of a conversation. She hardly looks like the outspoken activist who once climbed courthouse steps to wave placards and protest against the unfairness of Canada's marijuana laws. For several years the 38-year-old was at the forefront of the so-called "medical-marijuana" movement, which successfully forced the government to rewrite federal drug regulations so that people who need pot are not prosecuted for using it. [continues 540 words]
BURLINGTON -- Appearances can be misleading. I'm looking at the face that made her a captain of the cheerleader squad and a model. The face that has the strong bones of her late father. The face that, as we sit here, is wracked from within by a sharp, ugly pain that she tries to dull by pressing her finger harshly against her high cheek -- while lighting up another joint. "It'll help ... just give it time," says the 39-year-old former corrections officer, holding the stubby end of the smoke with a pair of scissors, and taking a drag. [continues 715 words]
Forcing users to break law for supply ruled unconstitutional Possession may be legal if Ottawa doesn't find source, experts say Ottawa has been given six months to come up with a way of ensuring sick Canadians have access to medical marijuana - including the possibility of setting up regulated distribution centres - or simple possession of the drug will become legal in Ontario, if not all of Canada, legal experts say. In a long-awaited decision released yesterday, an Ontario Superior Court judge struck down federal rules governing access to medical marijuana, finding them unconstitutional because they force seriously ill people who use pot as medicine to break the law to obtain the drug. [continues 523 words]
My letter is in response to what I believe are utter falsehoods Terence Young has spread via his written word regarding marijuana (Letters to the Editor, Dec. 18). First of all, Mr. Young has obviously never suffered from any dreaded illness enough to have to choose a medication such as marijuana. Mr. Young's "facts" are truly only a statement from this man himself, who believes he is representing his fellow Canadians. If this were truly his goal, Mr. Young would ask medical cannabis users or their loved ones to explain to him how and/or why it helps them. [continues 218 words]
Man Grows Marijuana For Friends Who Need The Weed To Feel Better DUNDALK -- It's Saturday morning and a small group of people, despite their serious illnesses, have gathered in a country mansion to help its owner harvest his crop. The seven work diligently, pausing occasionally only to step out to the wraparound deck and smoke marijuana cigarettes. The marijuana, which they all consider medicine, has allowed most of them to venture this morning to the 6,000-square-foot Dundalk-area home of Marco Renda, who has become something of an activist. The crop this day is medical-grade marijuana. [continues 776 words]
Laws Governing Marijuana As Medication Violate Constitution, Ontario Court Hears Marijuana helps Alison Myrden stay out of her wheelchair, she says. She smokes the drug and puts it into her tea and muffins. She uses 12 grams a day to alleviate the pain from her various illnesses, including multiple sclerosis. Without the marijuana, the Burlington, Ont., woman said she would be wheelchair-bound and dependent on 32 pills and a large dose of morphine to get through each day. Jari Dvorak says that marijuana alleviates his nausea so he can keep down the handful of pills he takes daily to fight HIV. He grows the marijuana on a Toronto balcony. [continues 539 words]
Medical Aid Challenged In Court Medical marijuana advocates and users have asked a Superior Court judge to turf regulations on the use of medicinal pot or order Ottawa to start dealing out the bud grown in Manitoba for more federal research. Eight people applied yesterday to the Ontario Superior Court to overturn the Marijuana Medical Access Regulations and the section of the Controlled Drugs and Substances Act that prohibits possession of grass. One of the applicants, Marylynne Chamney, said outside the University Ave. courthouse marijuana is the only thing she takes to deal with her epilepsy. [continues 107 words]
TORONTO - A group of seven people who smoke pot for medical reasons have gone to court to force Ottawa to provide them with marijuana to treat their illnesses. They say their constitutional rights have been violated because, while they and about 300 other Canadians can legally smoke pot to relieve nausea and pain, they can't purchase it legally. That means they have to buy it on the street, which exposes them to criminals, said Alan Young, lawyer for the seven. [continues 138 words]
The lives of hundreds of medical marijuana users in the Toronto-Hamilton area have been thrown into chaos by a police raid on a club that sold them dope. Toronto police raided the Toronto Compassion Club in mid-August, closing down the operation that bought dope from suppliers and sold it at street value to users. Many of those people are legal medical marijuana users with permits from the federal government. Others had only prescriptions from their doctors. The owners have been charged with trafficking. And now users say they can't get the "medicine" they need to ease their pain or medical conditions. [continues 1497 words]
Government Will Take Its Time In Deciding On Committee's Controversial Recommendation A Senate committee says anyone over the age of 16 should be allowed to use marijuana without fear of criminal prosecution. The committee's recommendation to legalize pot smoking immediately ignited a controversy when it was released yesterday. Marijuana advocates are lighting up to celebrate the senators urging the government to lighten up on illegal drug use. "I'm surprised and delighted they listened to us," says Hamilton artist Wayne Phillips. "They are usually thought of as a bunch of stodgy, elite politicians." [continues 945 words]
Anne McLellan's Reversal on Support for Medicinal Marijuana Should Make Canadians Sick Recently I went in hospital for a test that required injecting me with a radioactive drug. I told them, as I always do, that drugs invariably hit me harder than most people, and they nodded and shot me up with the standard dose, as always, and I vomited nonstop for the next eight hours. One of these days I'll write a column exploring why donning a white uniform induces deafness -- but not today. [continues 905 words]
But Patients Fuming At Health Canada Over Supply Delays They may have come from a meadow in British Columbia -- or a well-lit basement in Brampton, Ont. But whatever their origins, two strains of marijuana have been selected, from hundreds of others, as possible candidates for clinical research in Health Canada's beleaguered program to investigate and supply cannabis as medicine. Both varieties pack a punch, sources say, with a level of THC, marijuana's key active ingredient, of 10 percent and up. The strains have been cloned to produce plants in large quantities. [continues 826 words]
As Steppenwolf's John Kay sang back in the day, "the dealer is the man with the love grass in his hand." Conversely, "the pusher is a monster... he ain't a natural man." Advocates for the medical marijuana community in this country want the public to know that they need a legal "dealer," so they don't have to cop their dope from "the pusher" - -- or, in extreme situations, become somewhat like them. Alison Myrden is a thirtysomething woman trying to cope with the debilitating pain of Multiple Sclerosis. She is afflicted with one of the most rare manifestations of the disease, a condition known as trigeminal neuralgia. [continues 852 words]
