I Hear the Whistles Blowing. The Trainwreck is Coming As It Rolls Round the Track.

Canada has had exemption laws around medical cannabis use since 1999.

At that time, it started with exemption regulations under the Controlled Drug and Substances Act.

Then in 2000, after a court ruling it was determined that Canadians should be allowed to legally possess dried cannabis for medical purposes and that they could in fact, grow their own cannabis, designate someone else to grow it for them or buy it directly from a Health Canada sanctioned grower. 

As a result, in 2001, the Canadian government created and implemented  the Marijuana Medical Access Regulations. 

In 2013, these laws and regulations changed again and the new program was called the Marijuana for Medical Purposes Regulations. This rendition stripped away the rights of Canadians to grow or designate a grower on their behalf and opened up the commercial market to government approved corporations, only.

This ultimately forced all medical cannabis patients to buy plant material exclusively from "Licensed Producers" that the government approved of, otherwise they would be breaking the law.

Most medical marijuana patients who were growing for themselves or their designated growers were ordered to stop growing by the government and were told that they could only buy their medicine legally from the Licensed Producers.

This created huge supply and demand problems because there wasn't that many Licensed Producers to service the entire country. (As of today, there are only 34 Licensed Producers who can grow medical grade cannabis for the entire country. Strain specific supply is a huge problem.)

In February 2016, four medical marijuana patients took the Canadian Federal government to the Supreme court of Canada, claiming that the MMPR regulations from 2013 were in fact, in violation of section 7 of the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms. Specifically that the regulations put the security and liberty rights of medical marijuana patients at risk and that they (the government) were not providing reasonable access to cannabis medicine for Canadian patients.

The Supreme court ruled in favour of the people and ordered the Federal government to change their regulations for the fourth time in less than 20 years.

Today, the Canadian medical marijuana laws and regulations are called the Access to Cannabis for Medical Purposes Regulations and on August 24th, 2016 the government re-instated the right for medical cannabis patients to grow their own or assign a designated grower on their behalf.

If a medical cannabis patient decides to exercise this right to grow, there is an 18 page application that needs to be filled out and submitted to Health Canada along with the patient's doctor's signature of approval. All genetic material is still required to be purchased through the Licensed Producers which gives them a complete monopoly over the production of medical cannabis in Canada, even if they aren't the actual growers.

From my perspective, as a Canadian medical cannabis patient myself, the system has reeked of backroom deals, heavily padded by insider information.

The fact is most of the government sanctioned licensed producers are large corporations with traded stocks on the Canadian Stock exchange.

They are multi-million dollar corporations that have been able to muscle out the "Mom and Pop" dispensaries. Many of which have been in business for 30+ years and have just decided not to do the years of bureaucratic hoop jumping and palm greasing that is required to become a License Producer.

On average it is taking 3+ years for an applicant to be granted Licensed Producer status. Anyone selling cannabis, in Canada, without being a Licensed Producer is breaking the law and criminal charges apply in full.

This has created a lot of animosity between Licensed Producers and Dispensary owners. Many of whom started out from the same place in the beginning.

Illegally.

Competition is fierce between Licensed Producers themselves and between Dispensaries, all clamoring for the same medical cannabis patient business and anxiously waiting for full-legalization which will include provisions for recreational use. This has been promised by the government and April 2017 is the date that has been publicized for this event. 

In 2007, the Canadian government started to pay for the medical cannabis expenses of military veterans, police and first responders. Since 2007, the number of individuals that are using this program to treat a multitude of injuries and PSTD incurred during service has risen to 3,000. 

Yesterday, the Canadian government announced that it will be reducing the number of grams of cannabis they will pay for to 3 grams per day. Many people affected by this change have daily prescriptions of 10 grams a day and will be left to pay out of their pockets for any grams they consume over the new 3 gram maximum coverage allowance, when it comes into effect in May 2017.

Here's the story as posted on-line from CBC News on November 22, 2016:

http://www.cbc.ca/news/politics/veterans-hehr-pot-policy-1.3861534

It really hit the fan today and there will be more to come as audits of the entire system are undertaken.

I wish I could report more positively on this topic. Time will tell if Canada is in for a complete medical cannabis derailment, or not.

This type of stress isn't good for anyone, not to mention the 3,000 highly trained veterans, most with PTSD, where the options is homicide or suicide without proper medication.

I hope we can get this sorted without tragedy. 

I welcome your comments and invite you to follow me on my journey.

~Rebecca Ryan