Saskatchewan’s exempted medical marijuana users and growers are criticizing a decision by the federal government to stop individuals from growing the plant.
“I will be forced to purchase it from the government and that restricts me because I cannot produce the type that I like and that helps (dull the pain),” said Jason Hiltz, a medicinal marijuana advocate in Saskatoon who received an exemption in 2008 to grow the plants and take the drug.
Health Canada will no longer allow individuals to grow marijuana for medical use by 2014, federal Health Minister Leona Aglukkaq told CBC News on Friday.
Aglukkaq was reacting to a CBC investigation this week that Health Canada is ill-equipped to inspect licensed growers. There are also complaints from critics who say sanctioned growers are abusing their permits and often growing far more than they need. The individual grow-ops also attract break-ins, critics say.
The health minister said previously Health Canada wants to tender licences to produce marijuana in a way the same way as conventional drugs – by companies, under tightly regulated conditions. There are around 1,200 patients and 200 growers in Saskatchewan, who are limited to providing medical marijuana for up to two patients.
Shutting down licensed medical marijuana growers will only push people to obtain pot illegally, said Kaylynn Colby, 25, a Regina head shop worker who obtained an exemption after a doctor prescribed medical marijuana for pain.
“All they’re doing is creating demand in the black market,” Colby said.
In her teens, Colby suffered a herniated disc in her back that was never diagnosed. She suffers from severe juvenile arthritis, she said.
“All of the other painkillers they were (prescribing) were causing a lot more damage,” Colby said. “This (growing medical marijuana) was definitely the safer way to go about it. Since then I haven’t taken more pain killers for my condition.”
For Hiltz, two car crashes in 2005 and 2006 left him with a fractured vertebrae and spinal stenosis, which compresses his spinal cord, causing pain and weakness in his neck, shoulder and left arm.
An expert horticulturalist, Hiltz says the medical marijuana he produces is far better at dulling the pain than the government’s medical marijuana he would be forced to access.
Hiltz also says he can grow his own medical marijuana for around $140 per month compared to $540 for Health Canada’s mail-order pot, which is produced by Saskatchewan-based Prairie Plant Systems Inc.
Colby agrees that the medical marijuana produced for Health Canada isn’t as effective.
“I’ve seen it, I’ve smelt it and I would not want anything to do with it,” Colby said. “-I’ve never heard anybody satisfied or happy with it at all. It’s low-grade, poor quality, and it often doesn’t even help the medical condition very much.”
She would like to see the government increase the number of patients licensed growers can provide for.
“By allowing people to grow their own medicine, which is something that hasn’t hurt anyone, that would be a lot more beneficial than more rules and more boundaries and more punishment,” Colby said.
Source: StarPhoenix, The (CN SN)
Copyright: 2012 The StarPhoenix
Contact: http://www.canada.com/saskatoonstarphoenix/letters.html
Website: http://www.canada.com/saskatoonstarphoenix/
Author: David Hutton
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