Medicinal marijuana situation ‘confusing’

WELLINGTON: Those involved in the cannabis business in New Zealand say one of the biggest areas of confusion ahead of the forthcoming referendum is the legality, or not, of medicinal cannabis.

A doctor specialising in prescribing medicinal marijuana and a medicinal cannabis producer say both sides of the debate are fudging their messages.

Medicinal use is already permitted, but there is only one approved drug on the market.

The rest are ‘‘unapproved’’ drugs that can be prescribed by a doctor, but have not gone through the medical testing Medsafe deems appropriate.

GP Mark Hotu, of Green Doctors, in Ponsonby, admitted he was puzzled.

‘‘Even someone like myself who works with medicinal cannabis 24/7, 365 days a year, it’s even confusing for me,’’ he said.

‘‘I’m not surprised that the average person in New Zealand is also confused as well.’’

Dr Hotu said the confused messages about medicinal use were a reflection of the way cannabis had been perceived over a long time.

Cannabisbased drugs had been the subject of only a few quality studies to determine their effectiveness.

That would change in coming years, as the stigma around cannabis lifted, Dr Hotu said.

One company which hopes to run those clinical trials is Helius Therapeutics.

The firm had dedicated $10 million to drug trials, chief executive Paul Manning said.

‘‘To be honest, I think the main driver for funding for cannabis medicines will be clinical data to prove how these products are safe and how they work and a much larger demand for them through the general patient community,’’ Mr Manning said.

‘‘I think when these products become commonplace medicines . . . that’s probably going to become a larger driver for Pharmac funding.’’

His company would run several trials over the next few years, and submit that data to Pharmac.

The cost of unapproved cannabis medicines would drop before that, because they were starting to be made here, he said.

Mr Manning supported the referendum, because he thought it would reduce overall harm. ‘‘Prohibition has been an abject failure.

‘‘It hasn’t stopped the availability of cannabis in New Zealand, and it hasn’t slowed its consumption as hundreds of thousands of New Zealanders use [it] every day and they’re breaking the law.

‘‘The current system, in my view, hasn’t worked.’’

Dr Hotu said he was sitting on the fence at the moment, but he was leaning towards voting ‘‘No’’ in the referendum.

He said legalisation would cause harm to communities, not necessarily because of cannabis itself, but because of the impacts of smoking.

‘‘I can see the arguments on both sides. I hear the arguments from the Drug Foundation, and they’ve got some really valid arguments on the side of to support it,’’ Dr Hotu said.

He was concerned about safety for patients and communities.

‘‘If you look at the evidence of what’s happened in Canada, we’re going to have more people smoking and I don’t think that’s really the way that we want to go.’’

Pharmac director of operations Lisa Williams said it would consider funding any medicinal cannabis products that were cleared and recommended for use.

To date, only one medicinal cannabis product has been approved, and it is not funded by Pharmac.