\ COVeR stORy
august 12, 2015
A new frontier
mEdcanvZw.BE mcc-vZw.BE HgcacadEmy.com
flemish organisations team up to break taboo on medicinal marijuana continued from page 1
who can give them a prescription. Once they have the prescription, they can make an appointment for an intake interview with Hofman. If their case is approved, their doctor will again be consulted, and if the doctor agrees, the patients can pick up their personal cannabis plant at the MCC plantation. Patients can already buy marijuana plants in Belgium through non-profit Cannabis Social Clubs – like Trekt Uw Plant in Antwerp – but these don’t focus on offering medical cannabis. As a result, many patients have opted to travel to pharmacies in the Netherlands instead, where the legislation on medicinal cannabis is less strict. Medcan estimates that these trips to the Netherlands cost Flemish patients €360 on average.
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according to Dominique van gruisen, increased production of medical cannabis would benefit not just patients, but society as a whole
There is widespread support for medically prescribed cannabis “We will provide cannabis that is 65% cheaper,” says van Gruisen. Cannabis from MCC’s plantation costs €6.5 a gram, which means a monthly cost of roughly €157. Since this still represents a high cost for most patients, Medcan and MCC are launching the Adopt a Patient crowdfunding campaign on 15 August. The goal is to collect €100,000, enough to help 100 patients. The new initiative should keep patients from experimenting with marijuana cultivation themselves or, worse, buying cannabis from local dealers, who could be amateurs or involved in criminal organisations. “By weakening these players, we reduce the nuisance they cause in the streets and help the police,” says van Gruisen. MCC staff are keeping the location of their plantation secret for fear of becoming the target of criminal organisations. They have informed the police and prosecutor’s office of their project, however. So far, 28 patients have requested the help of Medcan and MCC. “Most of our patients are suffering from cancer,” says Geens. Others have epilepsy, MS, fibromyalgia, tremors or chronic pain. Research has shown that patients with ALS, Tourette’s syndrome and Aids might also benefit from medicinal cannabis. “In most cases, cannabis will not
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cure the disease, but it will improve patients’ quality of life considerably,” says van Gruisen. Van Gruisen saw the effect of medical cannabis first-hand when his grandfather, who had Parkinson’s, tried it. “He could hold a book without shaking and was able to concentrate again,” says van Gruisen. Cannabis similarly helped reduce the nausea bouts suffered by Geens’ father when he underwent chemotherapy for lung cancer. Geens himself uses medical cannabis to treat pains he developed following a severe motorbike accident five years ago. Six-year-old Sofie Voncken from Maasmechelen, who has a rare form of epilepsy, is one of the patients Medcan and MCC were able to help. She used to have some 50 “invisible” seizures a day, during which she just stared out blankly as if she was paralysed. Thanks to one drop of cannabis oil every day, Sofie now has just
a few seizures each week. Her parents say medicinal cannabis is the first product that has successfully treated her seizures. Since only adults can become Medcan members, Sofie’s father was the one to register with the club. The oil comes from a homeopathic doctor in the Netherlands. “Because she is able to concentrate and read again, Sofie can go back to school,” Hofman says. “We know we are operating in a grey area, but such successes for us confirm that we’re doing the right thing.” Still, cannabis offers no miracle treatment. It doesn’t work for every patient and doctors have warned about side effects like increased anxiety and deterioration of longterm memory. “It’s essential to create cannabis with a good balance between the substances THC and CBD,” says van Gruisen. THC is the substance with psychoactive properties that reduces pain and leads to
a high when present in elevated quantities. CBD mitigates THC’s psychoactive effects and has antiinflammatory, anti-tumoral, antipsychotic and relaxing properties. “We will adapt the kind of cannabis and the required doses specifically to the needs of patients, in consultation with doctors,” says van Gruisen. “Patients are also advised not to smoke cannabis in joints, but to use special vaporisers that help them consume the cannabis in a very controlled manner. This way, they can slowly increase their doses.” Seventeen doctors are currently collaborating with Medcan and MCC to offer patients medicinal marijuana, among them an oncologist and a neurologist. With their strict membership conditions and professional approach, the two founders hope to convince more doctors to participate. “Many are interested but afraid to develop a reputation as ‘cannabis doctor’,”
Geens explains. The two organisations also want to organise a meeting with organisations like the ALS League Belgium, to explain how medical cannabis can help patients, while the Foundation Against Cancer has already reached out to them for more information. Some of the marijuana plants at the MCC plantation will be used for research purposes. The initiative will also be evaluated by a team of researchers at Ghent University and the University of Leuven. This research project, which is being financed by the Flemish Fund for Scientific Research, is scheduled to start in October and end in 2018. It will also look at how Cannabis Social Clubs work. “This kind of in-depth, expensive research on medical cannabis is long overdue but a big step forward,” says van Gruisen. The three men behind Medcan, MCC and the HGC Academy are also hoping to meet with public health minister De Block. They say that, on the one hand, they are pleased with her careful, evidencebased policies. “We certainly don’t want cannabis to be abused to treat the slightest pain, like after you hit your toe,” says van Gruisen. “But it shouldn’t be treated as a last resort either, because it works better than many drugs now given at an earlier stage.” They also want the federal government to take a more progressive stance and to look at good practices abroad. In some 30 countries – among them the Netherlands, Switzerland, Israel, Canada and Germany – it is currently legal to buy several cannabis-based products in pharmacies. “I believe there is widespread support for medically prescribed cannabis among our population,” van Gruisen says. “Increased and more organised non-profit production of medical cannabis is not just good for patients but for society as a whole, as it can create more employment and reduce costs for the government.”
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