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the feds say they support usingmarijuana for medicinal purposes, but you wouldn’t know that from the horror stories some are telling.Cancer patients, AIDS and arthritis sufferers and people with injuries that stop them from working are among those who applied to Health Canada recently for an exemption that allows them to possess and grow pot for medicinal purposes without fear of prosecution. But all of them were rejected, even though doctors attested to weed’s therapeutic benefits in their cases.
Rejected applicants were told to try more rehab, get a psychiatric assessment or pain therapy.
One of them, Robert Neron, who lives in Hearst and suffers from cervical dystonia, which makes movement painful, even got a visit from the Ontario Provincial Police after he applied to have his pot exemption increased from one to two ounces a week. The cops carted away all his plants and charged him with cultivation.
Neron recently took his case to federal court. He and others have taken their pleas directly to the office of health minister Allan Rock, only to be “jerked around. It’s ridiculous what they make us do.”
Roslyn Tremblay, a spokesperson for the ministry, admits there are shortcomings in the approval system. “There have been a lot of complaints. We’re going through a learning curve .”
