Rumour has it...

Rumour has it, the Canadian Government wants out of the Medical Cannabis program. With the advent of the recreational program, I believe Health Canada foresees the newly minted Cannabis Industry providing all necessary services to those wanting their product. This in part, is happening because everyday people, including many patients, are going to recreational dispensaries to buy their cannabis. Government attitude toward cannabis has always been suspect. Just when society is starting to ask questions about the benefits of cannabis, they plan to pull the plug, placing us into a modernized version of an old prohibition.

The reasons the first prohibition of cannabis happened is still unclear. I think back in 1923 our leaders likely listened to large manufacturing companies instead of the entire medical system. Cannabis was once a common therapeutic for many ailments before it was outlawed. Shortly after prohibition was introduced, large manufacturing companies started teaching doctors how to practice medicine by matching ailments to a whole new world of pharmaceutical choices; there was money to be made. After seven decades, patients were successful in their legal challenge, creating a situation where the federal government was forced to recognize cannabis as a medicine. Today? I suspect, by behaviour, the federal government wants out, again.

In 2018, the Canadian Cannabis Act was proclaimed, which guided provinces to create new legislation, regulations, and policy. However, it all pointed to cannabis as something to fear, evident by how regulated health providers are currently treating cannabis as a substance of misuse. When creating a legal marketplace, The Cannabis Act constructed a new type of prohibition. We now have entire systems restricting the new Cannabis Industry from educating people about their product; today Cannabis cannot be promoted as something beneficial. If the federal government removes itself from the medical cannabis program, provincial health systems are certainly not ready to pick it up. Unlike the first prohibition, regulated health professionals are no longer taught to consider cannabis as medicine.

I understand the difficulties, everything related to cannabis is so different. It does not meet the measure of our modern medical musings, yet I still think the Endocannabinoid System should be required reading in all medical programs across our nation. Saying that may be hyperbole, but what should be more perplexing to us all is how doctors are stuck on the pathways provided by Big Pharma. Yes, there have been some great breakthroughs with lifesaving medications, antibiotics, and vaccines, yet successful lawsuits have also pointed to the criminal behaviours of many pharmaceutical companies. These large modern-day corporations are known to have lied about their research and have purposefully focused their follies on selling medications rather than patient care. It continues to surprise me how comfortable we are with using manufactured pharmaceutical products off label, while in the same breath, practitioners cite the lack of research when others choose cannabis. 

Cannabis is confounding medicine. It affects each of us differently.  The mode of consumption not only changes the pharmacological bioavailability, the many different Cannabinoids, Terpene, and Flavonoids, each have different pharmacodynamics. This is why I say it is lazy medicine to just send those interested in using cannabis as medicine to the recreational dispensaries. Unless a pharmacist is part of this care plan, I will also call it bad practice, because cannabis is a substance that affects people’s health.

If the rumours are correct and Health Canada drops the Medical Cannabis program, it will have damaging effects on peoples’ health, and a high demographic of these people are seniors. The question for me rests with responsibility of care. Human behaviour will always define cannabis as a medicine, so governments must comply. Besides, prohibitions have never been known to work, and reliving the 1990’s gets us nowhere fast.

Government is correct however, when it comes to the Cannabis Industry stepping forward to fill the gaps. I am interested in how the health system welcomes the newly minted Cannabis Coaching field of practice.  I believe this to be a career path for those wanting to work as an unregulated health care provider.  I just hope we have Medical Cannabis programming, so we can all watch them blossom.

KN