Steroids for the muscle memory that effortlessly regurgitates Re form propaganda
Holy Smoke
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There are more than 30 private clinics currently prescribing medical cannabis in the UK. You can find them in Sunderland, Leicester and London. Adverts on the London Underground or plastered on billboards recommend that you contact clinics to discover how you might treat your chronic pain, your sleep deprivation or your anxiety with vague-sounding “exciting new herbal treatments”...but the reality on the ground is that, at least when it comes to accessing treatment via the NHS, far less has changed than it might seem.
And now; a short history lesson...
And now; a short history lesson...
In 1839 William O’Shaughnessy wrote a monograph on Indian hemp that remains one of the most extensive scientific studies into the properties of the cannabis plant ever written. By conducting trials on fish, birds and eventually, controversially, children, O’Shaughnessy revealed the potential of cannabis in pain management. His investigations also found that cannabis was particularly useful in treating “convulsion disorders” – or what we now call epilepsy. He began sending botanical specimens to contacts at the Royal Botanic Garden in Edinburgh, spreading curiosity about the drug to the medical establishment in Britain.
In the face of a growing temperance movement, British politicians undertook a review of the supposed dangers of the plant as part of the Indian Hemp Drugs Commission of 1893 (see post #863), but declared cannabis a relatively mild intoxicant. However, as the US began to push for drug control legislation at a global level, things started to change. A moral crusade against drugs became one of the first foreign policy interventions of the United States at the start of the 20th century – a crusade that was carried forward by the League of Nations, which in 1925, at the Second Opium Convention, expanded its list of prohibited drugs to include cannabis.
The new international drug laws led to domestic legislation reinforcing the bans on the non-medical use of certain drugs. The 1928 Dangerous Drugs Act prohibited cannabis in the UK for the first time (the first Dangerous Drugs Act of 1920 had criminalised opium and cocaine). Cannabis products began to slowly disappear from the shelves of apothecaries. However, it wasn’t until after the second world war that cannabis was strictly policed in the UK, where cannabis smoking was associated with degenerates, alternative lifestyles and a Black immigrant population many were suspicious of.
In the face of a growing temperance movement, British politicians undertook a review of the supposed dangers of the plant as part of the Indian Hemp Drugs Commission of 1893 (see post #863), but declared cannabis a relatively mild intoxicant. However, as the US began to push for drug control legislation at a global level, things started to change. A moral crusade against drugs became one of the first foreign policy interventions of the United States at the start of the 20th century – a crusade that was carried forward by the League of Nations, which in 1925, at the Second Opium Convention, expanded its list of prohibited drugs to include cannabis.
The new international drug laws led to domestic legislation reinforcing the bans on the non-medical use of certain drugs. The 1928 Dangerous Drugs Act prohibited cannabis in the UK for the first time (the first Dangerous Drugs Act of 1920 had criminalised opium and cocaine). Cannabis products began to slowly disappear from the shelves of apothecaries. However, it wasn’t until after the second world war that cannabis was strictly policed in the UK, where cannabis smoking was associated with degenerates, alternative lifestyles and a Black immigrant population many were suspicious of.
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Apparently only TEN doctors, all private, are responsible for prescribing more than half of the so-called medicinal cannabis in Britain. The NHS prescribes relatively little.
See post #811
As i was saying before splineless jumped in without looking - the story in the Guardian today is a long read, so takes time to digest the implications of the position taken by opponents of decriminalisation and the promotion of medical cannabis: It tells the tale of Hannah Deacon and her young son, Alfie, who developed epilepsy at a young age. Doctors told the family he had a virus, but they couldn’t explain what the virus was. She demanded that Alfie be moved to the best children’s hospital in the country – Great Ormond Street in London. The doctors there gave him steroids, and after three and a half weeks of seizures, Alfie’s body finally stilled...
Alfie continued to suffer seizures every few months until, age five, he was diagnosed with a condition called PCDH19, a very rare form of epilepsy. The medication he was on was destroying his quality of life while also failing to stop his seizures. So, she decided to do her own research and found medical cannabis was available at private clinics and on the NHS. However, British doctors were unwilling to listen to her questions on the possibility of him trying the 'alternative' treatment and, faced with the impossibility of getting Alfie access to cannabis treatment in the UK, Deacon began to look abroad.
So she took him to Rotterdam where Alfie began a new treatment programme with medical cannabis at the heart of it. At first, it seemed that all their efforts had been futile, as the treatment seemed to have no effect on Alfie’s condition. But the doctors kept slowly increasing the percentage of CBD and when they had reached 150ml of CBD, he went 17 days without having a single seizure.
By the time the family returned to the UK, less than a year later, Alfie had gone 40 days without a seizure. Medical cannabis had proved to be essential in stabilising Alfie’s condition.
Alfie continued to suffer seizures every few months until, age five, he was diagnosed with a condition called PCDH19, a very rare form of epilepsy. The medication he was on was destroying his quality of life while also failing to stop his seizures. So, she decided to do her own research and found medical cannabis was available at private clinics and on the NHS. However, British doctors were unwilling to listen to her questions on the possibility of him trying the 'alternative' treatment and, faced with the impossibility of getting Alfie access to cannabis treatment in the UK, Deacon began to look abroad.
So she took him to Rotterdam where Alfie began a new treatment programme with medical cannabis at the heart of it. At first, it seemed that all their efforts had been futile, as the treatment seemed to have no effect on Alfie’s condition. But the doctors kept slowly increasing the percentage of CBD and when they had reached 150ml of CBD, he went 17 days without having a single seizure.
By the time the family returned to the UK, less than a year later, Alfie had gone 40 days without a seizure. Medical cannabis had proved to be essential in stabilising Alfie’s condition.
It's thanks to her struggle that the law on medical cannabis across the entire United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland was updated.... “But then,” Deacon said, “it became clear that changing the law wasn’t actually going to help people.”
When Alfie finally received his prescription for medical cannabis in 2018, in the form of a drug called Bedrolite, it was free on the NHS. However, since then, it has not been easy for other patients to access. For the past few decades, consultancy firms have been brought in to reshape the NHS in the image of the market, introducing cuts in the name of efficiency.
As a result, Britain has seen a huge growth in private health care, with 32% of Britons surveyed in 2024 now stating they have previously gone private for health treatment. The total value of the UK’s private health care market rose to £12.4bn in 2024, indicating the UK’s drift towards a two-tier medical system. And few things illustrate this two-tier system more clearly than the way medical cannabis has been rolled out since 2018.
When Alfie finally received his prescription for medical cannabis in 2018, in the form of a drug called Bedrolite, it was free on the NHS. However, since then, it has not been easy for other patients to access. For the past few decades, consultancy firms have been brought in to reshape the NHS in the image of the market, introducing cuts in the name of efficiency.
As a result, Britain has seen a huge growth in private health care, with 32% of Britons surveyed in 2024 now stating they have previously gone private for health treatment. The total value of the UK’s private health care market rose to £12.4bn in 2024, indicating the UK’s drift towards a two-tier medical system. And few things illustrate this two-tier system more clearly than the way medical cannabis has been rolled out since 2018.
In the years since Deacon’s efforts helped to pressure the government into legalising medical cannabis in the UK, only a handful of others have been able to enjoy the same access as Alfie. According to the NHS Business Service Authority, a total of 89,239 prescriptions for unlicensed cannabis medicines were issued between November 2018 and July 2022, but fewer than five of these prescriptions were issued by the NHS. The rest have had to go private.
The government has kept tight controls on the research into cannabis-based medicines, making it prohibitively expensive and a bureaucratic nightmare for scientists to build up the evidence base that would be needed for a wide rollout of the treatment on the NHS. Most cannabis-based medicinal products, while no longer legally prohibited, are unlicensed. Doctors need to apply for specialist funding when they want to prescribe it for an individual patient or request for their trust to fund it directly.
At the same time, the private medical cannabis industry in the UK has been quietly expanding. In August 2024, ITV News reported that the UK’s medical cannabis market was growing at a dramatic rate: about 10% a month, with companies launching aggressive digital advertising campaigns on Instagram and TikTok.
The government has kept tight controls on the research into cannabis-based medicines, making it prohibitively expensive and a bureaucratic nightmare for scientists to build up the evidence base that would be needed for a wide rollout of the treatment on the NHS. Most cannabis-based medicinal products, while no longer legally prohibited, are unlicensed. Doctors need to apply for specialist funding when they want to prescribe it for an individual patient or request for their trust to fund it directly.
At the same time, the private medical cannabis industry in the UK has been quietly expanding. In August 2024, ITV News reported that the UK’s medical cannabis market was growing at a dramatic rate: about 10% a month, with companies launching aggressive digital advertising campaigns on Instagram and TikTok.
Today, medical cannabis in the UK is ultimately driven by profit. This means potential patients receive targeted ads on their smartphones. And NHS professionals don’t always feel comfortable providing private cannabis clinics with the full medical information about the people who walk through their doors.
The emergence of a booming private medical cannabis industry across Britain has sporadically been in the news. Recently, medical cannabis returned to the national headlines after the death of Oliver Robinson – a 34-year-old man with a history of depression and cannabis dependency who took his own life in November 2023 after being prescribed medical cannabis by a private clinic.
(but conveniently ignoring the story of people like Alfie who received a life-changing benefit from his treatment.)
If Deacon was faced with Alfie’s illness today, while she would have been legally entitled to access medical cannabis in the UK, she would probably be forced to pay through the nose (potentially as much as £1,000 a month) to get it through the private market. For our future wellbeing as a society, we need to think seriously about how we design a post-prohibition framework for regulating drugs. With a bit of work, ours could be a society that minimises the harms of drugs while also sharing their life-changing potential benefits as widely as possible.
Taken from an edited extract out of The Next Fix: The Winners and Losers in the Future of Drugs published by John Murray on 4 June
The emergence of a booming private medical cannabis industry across Britain has sporadically been in the news. Recently, medical cannabis returned to the national headlines after the death of Oliver Robinson – a 34-year-old man with a history of depression and cannabis dependency who took his own life in November 2023 after being prescribed medical cannabis by a private clinic.
(but conveniently ignoring the story of people like Alfie who received a life-changing benefit from his treatment.)
If Deacon was faced with Alfie’s illness today, while she would have been legally entitled to access medical cannabis in the UK, she would probably be forced to pay through the nose (potentially as much as £1,000 a month) to get it through the private market. For our future wellbeing as a society, we need to think seriously about how we design a post-prohibition framework for regulating drugs. With a bit of work, ours could be a society that minimises the harms of drugs while also sharing their life-changing potential benefits as widely as possible.
Taken from an edited extract out of The Next Fix: The Winners and Losers in the Future of Drugs published by John Murray on 4 June
A Field of Dreams, growing in New York...
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