A proposal to make a very small dose of medical cannabis available over the pharmacy counter is just smoke and mirrors, a cannabis advocate has said.
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Lucy Haslam said a reported decision being considered by the Therapeutic Goods Administration, to grant access to cannabis without a prescription, was "an illusion".
The TGA would limit supply to a maximum daily dose of 60mg, with a maximum supply of 30 days.
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The proposal would also be restricted to medicines on the Australian Register of Therapeutic Goods. Cannabis is a natural plant which cannot be patented, which means there is no incentive for the pharmaceutical sector to pay for a lengthy and expensive series of clinical trials.
Users will instead continue to buy their medical cannabis on the black market, she said.
"The black market, if you could buy shares in it, that would be the place to put your money."
Government had largely ignored the recommendations of a Senate Inquiry issued in 2019, she said.
"The way they've set it up is effectively an approved, unapproved medication.
"They've put it into this regulatory limbo, where it can't ever be subsidised on the PBS."
The co-founder and director of United in Compassion lobbied hard for legislative reform after the death of her son, Dan, in 2015.
He used medical cannabis to treat nausea, pain and poor appetite during a years-long fight against bowel cancer.
She successfully won parliamentary support for legislation in his name, which permitted the cultivation of cannabis in Australia. But the process for winning approval to use the drug was so slow she now says Dan's Law was not a victory.
She blamed the influence of the pharmaceutical industry on government, biased bureaucrats at the TGA, and elsewhere, and inertia.
"The general public are onside, they all get it. They're all buying their cannabis on the black market. It's the ones that are in the positions of power that have the capacity to make things so much better.
"In this particular case that's certainly very evident in the high levels of the bureaucracy."
The TGA is expected to make a final decision in November.