Legalising medicinal cannabis step closer
SAJID Javid yesterday took a significant step towards the legalisation of cannabis for medicinal use.
The Home Secretary announced a review on using the banned plant for treating conditions such as severe epilepsy.
The move came after Mr Javid gave special dispensation to six-year-old epilepsy sufferer Alfie Dingley to use cannabis oil to stop his life-threatening seizures.
Alfie’s mother Hannah Deacon was moved to tears during a live TV interview after the review was announced.
She said she was “overwhelmed” by the news after a long struggle.
Amazing
Ms Deacon said she had been waiting three months for Prime Minister Theresa May to fulfil a personal assurance that Alfie would be allowed to receive cannabis oil.
Mr Javid had also permitted the use of cannabis oil to treat severely epileptic 12-year-old Billy Caldwell.
Billy had been admitted to hospital with seizures after supplies his mother had brought from Canada were confiscated at Heathrow Airport.
Billy’s mother Charlotte described the review as “amazing news” which she “applauded”.
Speaking to the House of Commons, Mr Javid stressed that the class B drug would remain banned for recreational use, despite suggestions by former Tory leader Lord Hague that it should be decriminalised. Mr Javid told MPs that the review would be held in two parts.
The first, led by chief medical officer Sally Davies, will make recommendations on which cannabis-based medicines might offer patients real medical and therapeutic benefits.
The second part will see the Advisory Council on the Misuse of Drugs consider whether changes should be made to the classification of these products on an assessment of “the balance of harms and public health needs”.
Mr Javid said: “If the review identifies significant medical benefits, then we do intend to reschedule. We have seen in recent months that there is a pressing need to allow those who might benefit Epileptic youngster Billy Caldwell with his mother Charlotte, who described the new review as ‘amazing news’. The 12-year-old suffers from seizures from cannabis-based access them.”
Mr Javid said that since becoming Home Secretary in April, it had become clear to him that the current legal position on medicinal cannabis was “not satisfactory for the parents, not satisfactory for the doctors and not satisfactory for me”.
But he insisted: “This step is in no way a first step to the legalisation of cannabis for recreational use.
“This Government has absolutely no plans to legalise cannabis and the penalties for unauthorised supply and possession will remain unchanged.” medicines to