UK: 99% of patients using medicinal cannabis are sourcing it illegally due to failures within the industry, a new report says

There are an estimated 1.8 million individuals using cannabis for medical purposes in the UK, but only 15,000 are legally prescribed patients, according to a new report by drug policy think tank Volteface.

Volteface-Report-_-Known-Unknowns

The report released today, “Known Unknowns of Medical Cannabis”, highlights the failures of the current medical cannabis provision for patients, leaving many people with chronic illnesses no choice but to risk criminalisation by using the illicit market to source cannabis.

For some cannabis patients, visiting a cannabis dealer or growing medicine at home is something that they are used to and comfortable with. However, there are many people for whom a drug conviction could have serious negative consequences in aspects of their lives such as employment, travel and even family relationships. 

To understand why access to prescribed cannabis is still limited for most people, the authors of the report interviewed 40 clinicians on the reasons why they think cannabis is so under-prescribed in the UK. Based on the responses from those interviews the report found the following factors:

  • A lack of specific evidence or efficacy 
  • An ineffective system of governance 
  • The uniqueness of cannabis as a medicine compared to man-made pharmaceutical products 

The report highlights a “critical lack of understanding about cannabis-based medicines amongst doctors”. Going on to say that the “vast majority of clinicians interviewed as part of the report said that they lacked support and understanding in the form of guidance, information and clear protocol around the practicalities of the prescribing process”.

Most of the doctors who were interviewed for the report “expressed a willingness to learn more about prescribing, particularly due to the urgent unmet need for novel drugs given treatment-resistance to medication amongst patients.” There was also discussion surrounding cannabis providing a promising alternative to prescribing opioids as a potential harm-reduction strategy.

Head of Operations at Volteface and author of the report, Katya Kowalski said, “It is clear that medical cannabis does not fit neatly into the healthcare system. In order to see this change and become mainstream, we have got to see a broadening of choices for clinicians to prescribe outside of the cannabis clinic model. Nowhere else in medicine do we see single-drug clinics. From my research, this is a major barrier within the medical community, something we need to see addressed in the sector, to truly broaden confidence amongst clinicians to prescribe more widely, in turn expand patient access.”

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99% of patients using medicinal cannabis are sourcing it illegally due to failures within the industry, a new report says

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