medical marijuana

BY JEREMY DEUTSCH, COQUITLAM NOW

The clock is now ticking on the life of the first and only medical pot dispensary in the Tri-Cities.

Following a marathon public hearing Monday night, Coquitlam city council voted unanimously to ban unlicensed marijuana dispensaries in the city and pass regulations on the location of federally licensed grow-ops.

However, council agreed to write a letter asking the federal government to establish the regulatory framework for the production and dispensing of medical marijuana.

Council was forced to grapple with the issue after the Coquitlam Natural Path Society, which runs a medical marijuana dispensary, opened up in the Maillardville area in June. Read more »

BY SPENCER ANDERSON, COMOX VALLEY ECHO

A Comox Valley medical marijuana advocate is challenging the constitutionality of federal regulations on the substance following police searches and his arrest at his home last year.

On Wednesday, Ernie Yacub filed a motion to challenge the constitutionality of sections of the Controlled Drugs and Substances Act (CDSA) as they apply to cannabis used for medical or therapeutic purposes.

Yacub is also seeking the dismissal of two counts of possession for the purpose of trafficking he is faced with under the CDSA. The charges were laid about three months ago, and he has entered not guilty pleas on both. Read more »

CBC News

A medical marijuana support group wants Alberta Health Services to reverse a decision that restricts its use of the drug at a Calgary hospital.

The MMAR Patient Support Group meets at the Sheldon M. Chumir Health Centre, where members use vaporizers to ingest marijuana during their meetings.

Vaporizers heat the plant and turn the active ingredient into a vapour, which is then inhaled.

"It was deemed safe by AHS before. And, of course, we're talking about no smoke whatsoever, this is the healthiest alternative. So, now AHS is asking us to go outside and smoke, and go stand with the cigarette smokers,” says Lisa Kirkman, a spokesperson for the group.

AHS says it never approved indoor use of the vaporizers at any of its facilities.

“Everything about the support group that is important is still there, and still we're able to do that, but unfortunately members now have to get up and leave at different times during the meeting to go and medicate, and this is going to be a real problem when it's -40 C (outside)," adds Kirkman.

CTV Vancouver Island

COURTENAY – The operators of a North Island compassion club put BC’s Supreme Court on notice today saying they’ll be challenging Canada’s medical marijuana laws because they are unconstitutional.

Lawyer Kirk Tousaw was in Courtenay representing his client, Ernest Yacub, appearing on charges of possessing marijuana for the purposes of trafficking. Yacub had been running the compassion club out of his rental home in Courtenay for seven years before RCMP raided it twice last year.

Tousaw told members of the media that the club is for medical cannabis consumers with serious medical conditions. He said under the Canadian Charter, people are entitled to possess the medicine and to have access to it from a safe and effective source.

Yacub pleaded not guilty to the two counts against him. The next court appearance on the matter is scheduled for August 23rd.

Follow Gord Kurbis on Twitter: http://www.twitter.com/CTVNewsGord

By David Hutton, The StarPhoenix; -With Files From The Canadian Press

Saskatchewan's exempted medical marijuana users and growers are criticizing a decision by the federal government to stop individuals from growing the plant.

"I will be forced to purchase it from the government and that restricts me because I cannot produce the type that I like and that helps (dull the pain)," said Jason Hiltz, a medicinal marijuana advocate in Saskatoon who received an exemption in 2008 to grow the plants and take the drug.

Health Canada will no longer allow individuals to grow marijuana for medical use by 2014, federal Health Minister Leona Aglukkaq told CBC News on Friday. Read more »

BY JASON HEWLETT, KAMLOOPS DAILY NEWS

Medical marijuana users say the RCMP is playing with their lives after officers closed down a Chase grow-op they say was a legal operation.

"They (the police) can't just do what they want," said John Louvros, who uses marijuana to curb the effects of AIDS and hepatitis C. "This guy was doing this out of the kindness of his heart."

Kurtis Bischoff, made a brief appearance before a justice of the peace in a Kamloops courtroom Thursday morning to apply for compensation and the return of his marijuana plants and licence to grow. Read more »

By Jessica Hume, CNews

OTTAWA - After admitting it is ill-equipped to track abuses of the medical marijuana grow-op licenses it issues, Health Canada says it wants to eliminate them altogether and replace them with a mail-order system.

"With over 20,000 Canadians using medical marijuana and each of them theoretically being able to grow it in their own home, this creates a system that would require massive amounts of people to inspect thousands of homes," a spokesman told Sun News.

"The new system will be designed to eliminate as much abuse as possible while making sure patients who have been prescribed medical marijuana are able to access it." Read more »

VOCM

The president of the Newfoundland and Labrador Medical Marijuana Society says there needs to be more education for doctors and the general public about the use of pot to help people control their pain.

Mike Dawe says his group helps people with their forms to obtain medical marijuana, and can also teach them how to grow it or how to find legitimate growers. Dawe says while it's true it's harder here for a patient to get a prescription, that's related to little information being provided to local doctors by Health Canada. 

He says it's not true that doctors need a special license to prescribe medical marijuana.

Canada.com

A new kind of patient’s rights group gathered on Parliament Hill Friday — people who use pot just to be able to get through their day.

The Medicinal Cannabis Patients Alliance of Canada (MCPAC) represents “chronically and critically ill” patients who require marijuana as a medicine. They’re upset that, more than a decade after Canada legalized the medical use of marijuana, doctors are still refusing to sign the declarations patients need to get legal access to pot. Proposed changes to Canada’s medicinal marijuana access program, they say, will create even more needless pain. Read more »

BY IAN MULGREW, VANCOUVER SUN

The federal government's plan to revamp Canada's medical marijuana pro-gram and address court-raised constitutional concerns seems half-baked.

The proposed changes ignore a recent B.C. Supreme Court ruling and do little to properly address some of the most contentious issues.

In particular, Ottawa intends to continue to permit only dried marijuana to be produced, sold and distributed to medical patients who will use a new document issued by doctors to buy pot from commercial producers.

That decision flies in the face of Justice Robert Johnson's ruling in April that patients could make cannabis-infused oils, drink it in their tea or bake it into brownies and cookies, not just smoke it. Read more »