The approval of medical marijuana by the Federal government this week means patients can now request it through their GP. Here’s what the experts have to say on the matter.
Associate Professor David Allsop is an Associate Director the Lambert Initiative at the University of Sydney for research on cannabinoid therapeutics.
“The announcement by Minister Hunt to allow the import and local storage of medical cannabis from overseas is a welcome step towards unblocking access to those patients who most need this medicine.
In having a local supply on hand, the timeline and costs of a patient getting access to medical cannabis products will be greatly streamlined.
Prior to this change, patients have faced a lengthy process of navigating federal and state level permissions and import permits, and overseas suppliers needing to organise export permits – all at significant financial and time cost to the patient.
These sourcing issues will now be dealt with in a faster more efficient manner.
There are some potential flash points that need to be considered also, such as whether allowing bulk importation and storage from overseas will in anyway interfere with the Federal Government’s November 2016 legislation, designed to encourage local Australian companies to establish growing and manufacturing operations for medical cannabis here in Australia.
It could be that allowing overseas importation lends significant competition to these emerging enterprises making it difficult to justify business models to investors.
The announcement also does not solve an issue installed by the Federal Government in November 2016, when access to medical cannabis was removed from the Category A route of the TGA’s Special Access Scheme. Cannabis is the only scheduled drug to have been excluded from this route of access – meaning that terminally ill patients cannot gain ready access in the timeframes appropriate to their dire situation, despite being arguably one of the patient groups most likely to benefit.
It also doesn’t change the fact that in order to gain access, a doctor still needs to make the application, but most doctors either do not know how to apply, do not have the required training or expertise to apply, or are politically or philosophically against supporting a medical cannabis application.”
Dr Scott Smid is a Senior Lecturer in Pharmacology at the University of Adelaide
“It’s a space that is moving fairly rapidly now. There is a strong advocacy from patient and community groups for improved access and The Government has responded to this with the recent announcement.
This is not without reason, for there is building anecdotal evidence of the effectiveness of medicinal cannabis for various conditions, but I see a critical next step as being to address more research into just how effective medicinal cannabis is and under which therapeutic context(s). It is cited as being effective in conditions ranging from epilepsy to neuropathic pain, arthritis and inflammatory bowel disease, but the clinical studies are either very few or ongoing and it will be the outcomes of these that medical practitioners ultimately look towards for guidance.