100,000 Canadians can use medical pot

Number more than triple last year’s figure

• The number of Canadians legally signed up to buy medical marijuana has more than tripled in 2016.

The Health Canada statistics reflect an explosion in the number of Canadians who are turning to marijuana to get relief from everything from chronic pain to nausea from chemotherapy.

By the end of September, nearly 100,000 Canadians had obtained prescriptions and registered to buy cannabis with one of the growers licensed by Health Canada. That’s a dramatic leap from the 30,537 people registered in September 2015.

The increase coincides with the switch in 2014 from a system dominated by patients growing their own marijuana to the introduction of large commercial grow- ops that sell cannabis by mail.

There is a growing awareness among both patients and doctors of the possible benefits of medical marijuana. Clinics and information centres have sprung up to advise patients on how to obtain cannabis legally.

The licensed marijuana producers have also devoted resources to educating doctors and the public.

Canopy Growth Corporation, for instance, the parent company for Tweed company in Smiths Falls, Ont., has sent experts to doctors’ offices across Canada to talk about the benefits of cannabis, and has sponsored education courses for physicians.

As the use of cannabis becomes more mainstream, more doctors are prescribing it, says Bruce Linton, Canopy’s CEO.

But Dr. Sana- Ara Ahmed of Ottawa, who began using cannabis in her practice a year ago, believes patients are driving the trend.

“There may be a few more doctors open to it. But I also believe it’s the same doctors, seeing more people. The direction is coming from the public. The direction is not coming from the physicians.”