Here's this weekend's column in the Kingston Whig-Standard.
The Harper government’s general approach to policy seems to be: ensure that it isn’t based on scientific evidence. Since our great leader’s rise to power scores of government scientists have variously been muzzled or fired. Nothing is surely worse than evidence coming in the way of implementing sacred-cow conservative policies!
The Harper government’s general approach to policy seems to be: ensure that it isn’t based on scientific evidence. Since our great leader’s rise to power scores of government scientists have variously been muzzled or fired. Nothing is surely worse than evidence coming in the way of implementing sacred-cow conservative policies!
I had no idea that medical cannabis was high on our dear leader’s
agenda, but it turns out that it is. Let me be clear about my take on cannabis.
It’s as close to a no brainer as it gets that adult access to it ought to be legal.
While there are health consequences if you inhale it, they are nowhere as bad
as those caused by alcohol, a drug much more likely to lead to dependency. No
wonder the Editor of the top medical journal The Lancet opined, ‘cannabis per se is not a hazard to society but
driving it further underground may well be.’ Unlike with alcohol, you can’t
overdose on cannabis. Perhaps that’s why our government is selling alcohol
directly to us, while it forces us to head to illegal dealers to access a
comparably much safer drug. We have discovered recently that one of Mr.
Harper’s best mates, Toronto mayor Rob Ford, tends to get so hammered from his use
of alcohol that he even forgets that he’s smoking crack on the odd occasion.
Trust me, there is nobody who is that severely affected from smoking a joint at
the weekend. Interestingly, Mr Ford
insists that he doesn’t have a drug problem, most likely because he doesn’t conceive
of alcohol as a drug. It’s here where our classification system has it all
backward. Surely whether an addictive substance is a drug or not cannot be a
question of its legal status. Honesty demands that we acknowledge also that the
prohibition of drugs of any kind has been an utter failure. Saying this, I’m not the odd guy out. The view
that the war on drugs has been an abysmal failure is shared by 68% of
Canadians, according to a 2012 representative survey. I am not a great fan of
cannabis myself. I tried it once or twice – who hasn’t? – and truly I don’t
know what the fuss is all about. Unlike Mr Ford I can’t get my head around
inhaling smoke. I cough immediately like there is no tomorrow. From what I
gather, that kind of defeats the purpose.
It turns out that there is another reason to legalize adult
access to cannabis. That reason came to the fore this week. There are tens of
thousands of Canadians who use medical cannabis for various ailments ranging
from glaucoma to pain management to asthma – in case you want to know: for the
latter it isn’t inhaled but drunk as tea. There is quite a bit of clinical
evidence to support the claim by medical cannabis users that cannabis has
beneficial effects. Still, cannabis isn’t actually an approved medication for
most or possibly all of these and other conditions. So, here’s the bizarre
system Mr Harper is foisting upon these patients. Obviously his major issue is
with cannabis itself, that damn hippie drug. He can’t stand it, or, more
likely, his conservative base can’t stand it. So his health minister developed
a nefarious scheme to remove access to cannabis effectively from legitimate
medical users.
Currently registered medical users are able to access
cannabis legally, even grow it legally for their own purposes, provided they
meet certain clinical conditions, and provided a doctor certifies that they
meet these conditions. Yes, you heard correctly, our current system asks
doctors to write quasi scripts for cannabis. That’s a bit odd, because cannabis
is not actually an approved drug to treat any of the conditions currently on Health
Canada’s list of approved clinical conditions. Thank our legal system for this
mess. Many doctors are rightly annoyed about being dragged into this medical
cannabis business at all. Some doctors tried and quickly discovered that their rooms
were overrun by healthy folks who really just wanted to get legal access to
cannabis. Their neighbors weren’t terribly excited about their doctors’ new
‘patients’ either. In any case, while the current system wasn’t perfect, it
permitted legitimate access to bona fide medical cannabis users. Those who
chose not to grow their own supply could buy it from a government facility.
Within the overall unjust context of the ongoing criminalization of adult
access to cannabis, this system worked, up to a point.
Mr Harper’s health minister cooked up a scheme to subvert the
current status quo. Combine that with Harper’s love for private
entrepreneurship and voila you get the new system, coming your way in 2014.
Clearly the Harper government’s main concern was to limit medical cannabis
users’ access. This is achieved by first eliminating their current ability to
grow their own affordable supply in a controlled manner. Then remove the government
production facility and open the field to cannabis entrepreneurs. Give licenses
to these medical cannabis entrepreneurs and permit them to charge the living
hell out of current medical cannabis users. Many patients have done their budgets
already and discovered that their annual bills will go up from several hundred
dollars to tens of thousands of dollars. There is, of course, that minor
constitutional issue of equal access. Harper has created a system whereby only
the wealthiest of medical cannabis users will be able to afford continuing
access, but nobody else. One company, CanniMed is currently pricing medical
cannabis at between $9 and $12 per gram. Compare that to just cents per gram
for homegrown cannabis. Many medical cannabis users will almost certainly
resort to buying cannabis illegally on the street. No surprise the CBC’s The National managed to find a masked
illegal cannabis dealer celebrating the new legislation and the financial
windfall it means for his business. That’s how our federal government
effectively criminalizes medical users of cannabis while permitting at the same
time clever business people to make a fortune on the backs of desperate
patients. Well played Mr Harper, no
doubt the victims of your legislative efforts will see you in court.
On the good news front, on federal level both the NDP as
well as the Liberal Party support the decriminalization and legalization of
cannabis use respectively. They are in line with the close to 60% of Canadians
supportive of legal, controlled adult access to cannabis. However, don’t hold
your breath hoping for government support on that front. Being out of touch
with the majority of Canadians on important matters of public policy is a
hallmark of this government. To be fair to Mr Harper, he doesn’t have to care.
After all, he was elected to an absolute majority government on the basis of
just a 39.62% share of the popular vote, courtesy of our first-past-the-post
way of doing democracy.
Udo Schuklenk holds the Ontario Research Chair in Bioethics
and Public Policy, he tweets @schuklenk
