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Cannabis Campaigners' Guide News Database result:
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Canada: An Open Letter to Rona Ambrose Jason Wilcox Cannabis in Canada Monday 15 Jun 2015 As a medical cannabis user and a patients’ rights activist, I am deeply troubled by your role in limiting patients’ access to safe, affordable, and effective medicine. Your tenure as Health Minister has been plagued by poor policy that has proved costly for Canadians, both in terms of their well-being and the costs involved in the legal challenges against the Marihuana for Medical Purposes Regulations (MMPR). The Supreme Court of Canada (SCC) ruled on Thursday June 11th that the MMPR is simply not constitutionally sound and infringes upon Section 7 of the Charter of Rights and Freedoms. Your “outrage” at the decision is troubling and flawed. You represent health, Minister Ambrose, the health of all Canadians. As an advocate who has lived with HIV/AIDS and HCV for 22 years I have never felt more compelled to write a letter such as this. Your ignorance towards the cannabis plant and its use for medicinal benefit is dumbfounding, and your reluctance to trust in science and scholarship is frightening. To maintain your position that cannabis has no medical virtue is both counter to facts and the beliefs of your constituency. If your government does not believe that cannabis has medicinal merit, why title the program the Medical Marihuana Access Regulations? The contradiction is baffling. To be fair, you only arrived as Minister as the MMAR was being repealed, so really you know nothing of Health Canada's Medical Marihuana Access Decision (MMAD) which was governed by the program from 2001-2014 when the it and the MMAR were repealed on your watch. So from 2001-2015 the federal government has called the regulations governing cannabis “medical” and, Minister Ambrose, you preach an absence of medical value? Through Health Canada, under legal discovery, we learned there are an estimated 500,000 medical users of cannabis in Canada. Can you explain the contradiction? Can you explain ignoring facts? I worked directly on the Allard case and learned a lot from legal discovery including the wealth of medical and anecdotal proof Health Canada has and submitted to the courts to support the MMPR and patients need for cannabis. The manner in which you, as Health Minister, continue to spout tired and ill-informed rhetoric while the courts, science, and the people all agree you’re wrong is irresponsible. Your government spent over one million dollars fighting us in Allard, fighting absolute truth while preventing patients from accessing their medicine. At what point will you recognize your ignorance is costing lives? At what point do you step aside and let a more progressive and informed representative govern the health of Canadians? With all due respect, I say that time is now. Jason Wilcox Founder/Director Cannabis Rights Coalition http://cannabisincanada.ca/blog/open-letter-rona-ambrose/
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