Medical Marijuana in Australia

[chakakan]

Gday,

 

Recently i have been doing a whole heap of reading and watching doco's ("In pot we trust", "Waiting to inhale") about the medical marijuana revolution in some U.S states, in particular california. I am amazed by the growing number of semi-legal cannabis dispensaries (hortipharm etc) that are in business and it got me thinking...

 

I know Australia's drug laws are state-specific, but can anyone tell me whether Australia has anything going on like what is happening in California?

 

I have had a quick look on a few search engines, but can't find anything that relates to medical marijuana and cannabis dispensaries in particular.

 

Any information would be greatly appreciated

[freddie]

Hi chakakan, California is light years ahead of us in many areas including medical marijuana. The only link I can find is this and I am not sure how up to date it is.

 

http://www.mercycenters.org/links/Australia.html

 

and more specifically:

 

http://www.medical-cannabis-information-se...submission.html

 

I don't know how recent this is. Also if I shouldn't be posting this here could a mod please remove it. :peace

Edited December 19, 2007 by freddie

[pipeman]

years ago there was legislation passed in NSW to allow a medicinal marijuana program, but the government just stalled and never did anything on it as far as I know.

[chakakan]

Thanks for the replies.

Hopefully with this new government, the cannabis movement can push forward.

[Pam]

I'll help you all I can. I don't know if you've seen this one yet, but take a look, maybe get some help.

 

www.SafeAccessNow.org

 

It's the Americans for safe access site in Oakland CA. I've been to a few of the Cali clubs and it's amazing even to me!

You can buy seed, weed, hash and edibles. There are billboards advertising the clubs!

Every so often the Feds pop in and try to shut them down, but they open right back up the next day since state law makes them perfectly legal.

It's a battle for states rights for the 12 states right now that have made med pot legal, and so far every democratic candidate for president claims they will put an end to the Feds raids in states that allow med pot. Half the republicans say the same. We shall see.

If that happens, I'm sure most if not all the other states will follow, since the main argument most of the politicians give for refusing to pass the bills, is that the feds deem med pot to be illegal.

[chakakan]

Thanks Granny,

I cant even begin to comprehend being able to have that kind of access to cannabis and cannabis related products. Its overwhelming

 

Hopefully, with the exit of Bush the new president follows through oh his/her promises re medical marijuana.

With the US moving in this direction, we can only hope Australia follows in their footsteps.

[Al B. Fuct]

Nope, no medicinal cannabis exemptions in Aus at present.

 

New PM Kevin Rudd is unlikely to be a progressive on rec drug legislation or on medicinal cannabis. Rudd indicated during the campaign that he's as 'zero tolerance' as the conservative he replaced.

 

However, I do think there's more possibility of shaping Rudd's drug policies through public pressure than his predecessor's.

 

Former NSW Premier Bob Carr announced a 4-year medicinal cannabis trial in 2003- which simply fell flat. Nothing ever happened with it.

 

Not going to hold my breath waiting for Rudd to be a progressive on cannabis, but hope springs eternal.

[slashpot]

So I guess it's just a matter of living in the right country, and then living in the right state. Doesn't look good in the short term, does it?

[medcanaware]

We have been writing to the Australian Government (all sides) for the past 4 years. Some are in favour of legalisation /decriminalisation, but the main honchos always had nothing good to say about Cannabis full stop. Oh, they might have 'said' that people were working on the idea of medical cannabis....BUT....only through Big Pharma and only as a pill, potion, suppository basically. There was usually the tired old excuses that

 

1) Medicine can't be smoked ...(well, Cannabis does not have to be smoked, it can be vapourised -no smoke), eaten or drunk as a tea)

2) "We must think of the children and the effect it will have on them".....(As if children aren't already subject to their 'legal' drugs in abundance - they're everywhere...and they're toxic!)

3) "There is no way to know exactly what is in each plant, we haven't found out yet what the other cannabinoids do".

(Well, 5,000 years of people using naturally grown cannabis and not one recorded death from cannabis alone).

4) And , even though they haven't exactly said it....it rings true....."If we can't deal it, you can't have it", and as we all know, you can't patent a plant!

 

We went to the streets and market for 6 days in December and were amazed at how many people came up to read our poster boards and to talk to us. Out of about 400 people who came to the area we were in, there were only 3 negatives. We met so many people who had either used it as medicine themselves, were still using it, had been carers to someone who used it, or knew someone who used it. So, it appears, there are a great percentage of people who are in favour of using cannabis as a medicine, and most of them didn't like the idea of Big Pharma 'tampering with', 'adding to' and 'changing' the plant into a pill.

[freddie]

We have been writing to the Australian Government (all sides) for the past 4 years.

 

Good on you for doing this. Can I ask who "we" is? If there is an organisation who are trying to get medial marijuana looked at I am interested.

 

We met so many people who had either used it as medicine themselves, were still using it, had been carers to someone who used it, or knew someone who used it.

I didn't think many in Australia used medical marijuana. This surprises me.

Edited February 13, 2008 by freddie

[Guest niall]

We have been writing to the Australian Government (all sides) for the past 4 years.

 

We went to the streets and market for 6 days in December and were amazed at how many people came up to read our poster boards and to talk to us.

 

Fucking awesome mate, what can we do to help?