Cannabis should be legalised for the sick and Britain is lagging behind most of the developing world by failing to prescribe it, a report by MPs and peers will say today.
Theresa May has been urged to allow patients legal access to the drug if their doctor approves it.
Following a seven month inquiry, the All Party Parliamentary Group on Drug Policy Reform found cannabis worked as “medicine for a number of medical conditions”.
Campaigning MP Frank Field said Britain was failing to keep pace with other countries by failing to grant very sick patients legal access to cannabis.
He said: “Hundreds of thousands of people in our country are forced to decide between putting up with unbearable pain, chronic nausea or alternatively, breaking the law.
“Compassion demands that we grant those people legal access to prescribed cannabis if their doctor feels it will make life more bearable.
“Such a change has got to be rigorously enforced so it is not seen as a move to general legalisation. But there is no one better to introduce and enforce this measure than Mrs May.”
In a survey of 623 patients who use cannabis medicinally conducted for the APPG, it found 24 per cent used cannabis to control chronic and severe pain; 12 per cent for arthritis, 21 per cent for insomnia and 9 per cent for fibromyalgia.
Almost a third of users said say their depression improved and 26 per cent experienced less anxiety when taking cannabis.
Nearly half of the patients had taken prescribed medications before trying cannabis and found those medications had not relieved their symptoms or had made their condition worse.
About 45% reported a modest improvement in their condition.
Baroness Molly Meacher, chair of the APPG, said the findings of the inquiry and review of evidence from across the world were clear.
She said: “The evidence has been strong enough to persuade a growing number of countries and US states to legalise access to medical cannabis.
“Against this background, the UK scheduling of cannabis as a substance that has no medical value is irrational’.
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Full Article: Marijuana Should Be Legally Handed Out By Doctors, Say MPs And Peers In House Of Lord
Author: Lynn Davidson
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