"..... brother can you spare a joint?"

Medical Marijuana Users Owe Ottawa More Than $500,000
By Dean Beeby
Globe and Mail
April 14, 2008
Page A5

Medical marijuana users are on the hook for more than $500,000 in unpaid bills for the government-certified substance, raising questions about the effectiveness of Health Canada's troubled pot porgram.

Newly disclosed statistics show that Health Canada has sent final notices - and sometimes dispatched a collection agency as well - to 462 registered users since government marijuana first became available in 2003.

"Most of the 462 individuals who have received a lettter regarding their accounts in arrears have had their shipment ceased," department spokesman Paul duchesne said in an e-mail.

The unpaid bills, totalling $554,255 as of December 31, have tripled in value in the past two years and have resulted in some seriously ill citizens returning to the black market for their medication. The marijuana distribution service was specifically designed to give patients a legal alternative to street pot.

Officials have handed 29 overdue accounts to collection agencies that so far have been able to recoup just $2,000.

The statistics, acquired through the Access to Information Act and questions to Health Canada, suggest a deeply flawed program as the number of users in arrears has soared to about two-thirds of all 739 patients licensed to buy government marijuana.

A series of adverse court rulings since 2000 forced Health Canada into the medical marijuana business. The program licenses certified users who have been prescribed cannabis by their doctors and allows them to grow their own, have someone grow it for them or buy directly from the department.

Health Canada has paid Prairie Plant Systems Inc. more than $10-million to cultivate a strain of pot in a mine shaft in Fin Flon, Manitoba. Accredited patients can then buy the cannabis with a THC content - the active ingredient - of 12.5 per cent, for $5 a gram.

The department has said it plans eventually to end its licensing of home-grown pot, forcing all medical users to buy their supplies directly from the government, perhaps through pharmacy distribution. Prairie Plant systems now couriers the marijuana in 30-gram packets directly to users.

Spokesmen for the department did not respond to requests for comment.

Health Canada previously allowed a 90-day grace period for payment but has since reduced it to 30 days before considering an account in arrears. Other restrictive changes have been made to the program in the past two years, including efforts to persuade doctors to keep doses low.

Many seriously ill medical users are impoverished, unable to work, and survive on disability payments, provincial drug plans and charity. Medical marijuana has never been assigned official drug status by Health Canada and is, therefore, not covered by pharma-care programs.

Users typically smoke marijuana to combat nausea and pain associated with chronic ailments, resulting from such infections as HIV and hepatitis C, after standard medicines fail.

Mark Schollenberg, 42 of Stoney Creek, Ontario uses marijuana to control chronic pain from a series of workplace injuries. Unable to work and on disability payments, he initially used street marijuana but changed his mind.

"I thought instead of causing myself any problems, I should get a licence and do it legally," he said in an interview.

With a doctor's approval, Mr. Schollenberg got a licence and ordered his first batch of Health Canada marijuana last summer, assuming Ottawa would cover the costs.

He was cut off in October, now owes $3,962.34 including interest, and is back on the street to purchase his medicine.

"I can't even afford the black market," Mr. Schollenberg said of his five-gram-a-day requirement.

The Canadian Press