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Cannabis campaigner is found unconscious
Morag Lindsay Press & Journal, Aberdeen
Wednesday 02 Jul 2003 MS sufferer may have overdosed Charges against Biz, 55, dropped A MULTIPLE sclerosis sufferer, who threatened to kill herself after being accused of supplying cannabis chocolates to other patients, was taken to hospital yesterday after apparently overdosing on painkillers. The dramatic turn of events came as the Crown decided to drop charges against 55-year-old Elizabeth Ivol because she was too sick to stand trial. Miss Ivol, also known as Biz, was taken to hospital yesterday morning, after being found unconscious at her home on the Orkney island of South Ronaldsay. A spokeswoman for NHS Orkney said she was in a stable condition in Balfour Hospital in Kirkwall last night. The cannabis campaigner had always said she planned to end her pain by taking her own life once the court case was completed. Last month, she took delivery of a cardboard coffin and arranged for friends to look after her pet cat following her death. She was accused of possessing, supplying and cultivating cannabis after police visited her home in August 2001. A makeshift court had been convened for her trial at Kirkwall's leisure centre, because it offered better disabled access than Kirkwall Sheriff Court. Yesterday, her solicitor James McKay told the court her GP had produced a report stating her illness had left her "unfit for any further court appearance". Procurator fiscal Sue Foard accepted the findings of the report, which was dated June 23, saying it would be inappropriate for the case to continue. Speaking at the end of the proceedings Sheriff Colin Scott Mackenzie told the court it was "an unsatisfactory ending to a sad case". He added: "Given all the publicity that this has attracted I feel I have to say that any questions of legalisation or decriminalisation of cannabis is a matter for the politicians and not for the courts" During her trial, which began two weeks ago, Ms Ivol said she started taking cannabis to numb the pain of multiple sclerosis (MS). She told the court she came up with the idea or what she called her "special Belgian chocolates" after agreeing to help a non-smoking MS sufferer. She developed a formula for the drug-laced confectionery as well as cannabis patches which can be directly applied to the skin. Ivol added that she had tried a long list of legal medication supplied by her doctor but claimed some of the drugs had "horrific" side effects. The court heard her day-to-day life had become almost unbearable since she was diagnosed with the incurable condition in the early 1990s. She said: "At the moment I feel like somebody's pulling barbed wire through my spine. "I have muscle spasms and my eyesight's failing but it has not gone yet. It is very, very painful. "I'm completely and utterly paralysed from the neck down, more or less." She said she resisted using cannabis for two years because of the stigma attached to the drug, but eventually gave in and began smoking one cannabis joint each evening. "It was either cannabis or nothing. I tried everything else and nothing worked," she said." Speaking after the case was abandoned, Clara O'Donnell, spokeswoman for the Legalise Cannabis Alliance, said: "In my view those in charge of deciding the future of the case should have dropped- it two years ago."'
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