Dutch Health Minister
Wants to Promote Cannabis Medicine 
Thursday, November 8th,
2007
Lots of marijuana news lately. The Dutch
Government said yesterday that they are looking to promote the
development of medical marijuana and cannabis-based meds, as well as
extend the plant's availability in pharmacies.
Cannabis is already available by prescription
in the Netherlands, of course.
"Medicinal cannabis must become a regular
registered medicine," said Health Minister Ab Klink in yesterday's
statement. The Dutch Govt. regulates the growing of special types
of cannabis in labs that supply pharmacies. "This development
track will take years, but it can yield scientific evidence and give
insight into the balance between safety and effectiveness of medical
cannabis."
"By making medical marijuana available as a
raw material for five years, I want to give this track a serious
chance."
Canada approved a cannabis-based medicine to
treat MS patients in 2005.
In the Netherlands, though, even if they have
a doctor's prescription, many patients just buy it at a third of the
price in "coffee shops," where marijuana is technically illegal but
allowed in small amounts to anyone at
all.
Yet the Netherlands' Trimbos Institute for
Mental Health and Addiction says that after 30 years of the Dutch's
"tolerance" policy, usage rates are in the middle of international
norms. France, Britain, and the U.S., they say, use more marijuana
that they do.
Those laws are really working, aren't
they?
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