Could pot help cut Pam’s joint pain?

PAM ST CLEMENT says her auto-immune condition has made her worryingly reliant on pain medication for a decade – but has found a surprising alternative.

The actress – who famously played Pat Butcher on EastEnders for 25 years – reveals that the incessant pain in her joints “has meant I’ve been on some not very nice drugs for the last 10 years”. The 75-year-old tells Day & Night: “It’s not a form of arthritis but it is similar in the pain it gives you. It’s kept down by medicine which I’d rather not take to be honest.”

The TV legend says it also affects her work: “It depends what state I’m in. You can always take a painkiller. That’s why I’m on meds… to keep the inflammation down. It is manageable. However, when you take a drug you end up taking another drug to counteract the effects of the first one. It goes on. It’s a spiral… It would be nice to find an alternative, provided after all this time that I can come off what I’m on.”

And, as Pam has recently found, one alternative could be marijuana, which she tries in new ITV show, Gone To Pot, tonight, alongside Christopher Biggins, Linda Robson, John Fashanu and Bobby George (see previous page). The quintet, who all have medical problems – including joint and back pain – take a road trip around California and Colorado, where the drug is legalised for medical and private recreational use.

All sampled it for medical conditions and Pam says “most of us came away feeling it had helped” and she’s for legalisation – though it must be used responsibly as there are downsides, the programmes show.

She says: “I will now definitely consider using marijuana to see if that would help.”