Exhausted MS Patient Harichy
Abandons Court Fight; Will Try For Bureaucratic Exemption.
"Surely, Canada can do better." -- Great Column In Her Hometown Paper
(Marijuananews note: Great journalism!In some
ways, Canada’s position on medical marijuana is even more incoherent than
DEAland’s. In fact, Health Minister Allan Rock’s actions – or inaction --
directly contradicts his own statements.
He doesn’t deny having used marijuana himself, and has recognized that it has
medical benefits, but he seems to be doing everything possible to delay the inevitable.
See
Health Canada
To Spend Five Years and Millions
Playing the Research Game Trying Avoid Medical Marijuana
Canada has outwaited Harichy and has won a partial victory against another MS patient,
Grant Krieger, but – sadly- there is no shortage of people with serious illnesses.
See
Have The Sick
And Dying Liberated Alberta Yet?
No, But They Are Working On It.
Beating one or two sick people in court or in bureaucratic stalling accomplishes
nothing, except to cause more suffering.
Some of the Canadian media have been scathing in their criticism of Rock, and the
public is overwhelmingly in favor of medical marijuana, and even the police have accepted
it, so there is no political advantage for him. On the contrary. This is just one more
puzzle in the weirdness of marijuana prohibition.)
See
"Rock keeps
talking about doing trials, but trials have already been done. There is already sufficient
proof that cannabis helps people deal with their pain." -- Ontario Arthritic Facing
Marijuana Charge.
"My death will be slow and painful. Now, I have this criminal charge against me,
and my children are about to lose their daddy over it."
and
78 Percent Of
Canadians Favor Medical Marijuana – What Is Rock Waiting On? DEAland?
and
Canadian
Health Minister Owes Medical Marijuana Activist Wakeford "An Apology
And Canadians An Explanation"
September 23, 1999
From The London Free Press
letters@lfpress.com
http://www.canoe.ca/LondonFreePress/home.html
http://www.lfpress.com/londoncalling/SelectForum.asp
By Julie Carl
(Marijuananews note: This is an Op-ed column, but it is a strong
statement that must reflect an improvement in the Free Press’s semi-enlightened
position.)
See
Ontario
Editorial Is In No Hurry to Arrest MS Patient Harichy, Nor In Any Hurry for Justice
CRUSADE ENDING BUT LANDMARK FIGHT LOOMS FOR POT USER
Lynn Harichy's long-awaited day in court should be a short one. The London grandmother
and multiple sclerosis sufferer expects to have a charge of marijuana possession against
her stayed in court Monday.
Instead of fighting a courtroom battle to make medicinal
marijuana available to people with MS, cancer, AIDS, epilepsy and any other illness it can
ease, she plans to spend her waning energy on a bureaucratic fight to allow her alone to
grow and use the weed.
If successful, she'd be only the third person -- and the first without a terminal
illness -- to be exempted by Health Canada from prosecution on marijuana cultivation and
possession charges.
The exemptions are part of a plan Health Minister Allan Rock announced this spring to
weigh marijuana's medicinal use.
See
Canadian Health
Minister Issues Call To All Pot Growers To Send Him Their Resumes.
In The Meantime, He Is Going To Try To Get Marijuana From DEAland.
Maybe He Will Have Better Luck Than Our Own Researchers.
Two AIDS Patients Get Exemptions.
It's been two years since Harichy, 38, pulled out that joint on the steps of the London
police station. Her political statement -- that marijuana eases sick people's suffering
and makes a relatively normal life possible – was one she wanted to continue in
court.
See
Trial
Delayed Again For Canadian MS Patient Lynn Harichy Until Ruling On Parker Case
In July 1998, in another step in that fight, she and her husband, Mike, opened the
London Cannabis Compassion Centre, a club that supplied medicinal marijuana to sick people
with a doctor's note. The club closed in March after Rock announced the government would
hold trials of medicinal marijuana, but not before Mike Harichy was arrested and charged
with trafficking.
See
Narcs Arrest Husband
Of MS Patient Harichy At Cannabis Compassion Centre.
32 Grams Of Medical Marijuana Seized In Major Drug War Victory!
A Clear Challenge To Health Minister.
His trial starts Oct. 5.
That worries Harichy. But she doesn't worry about the outcome of
her own charge, which -- if stayed -- could be reactivated against her within the next
year.
"If I end up in jail it's no different to me from not having my medication. I end
up in pain either way."
Being in jail would at least have the advantage of exposing people in the system to her
agony without marijuana, she says.
When she has the drug, she's relatively symptom-free. It takes about eight days after
her last toke for the tingling and numbness to start. Not long after, Harichy's balance is
shot. She's often paralysed on one side. She sometimes goes blind.
The pain is overwhelming.
And the disease's traditional medication makes it worse, she says.
Since her arrest on the police station steps, two other medicinal marijuana cases have
successfully wended their way through the Ontario courts and proven her point. In one
case, a temporary exemption was won; in the other, a permanent one, now under appeal.
See
Canadian Justice Runs
Out of Patience With Government
Before Patient Runs Out Of Time;
Exempts Wakeford From Marijuana Laws. Implications for Others
As Harichy waited out the postponements and delays -- on pricey lawyer time -- her
health deteriorated. Tiny and frail, she can no longer afford the energy or the money to
continue.
And that's disappointing to her.
She remembers her mother, in the final stages of breast cancer in 1991 -- before
Harichy was using marijuana to treat her own illness -- begging her for some marijuana.
"All I could think was my mother would go to jail, and she wouldn't have any
health care at all," Harichy recalls. "I know now her final days didn't have to
be so bad.
"It shouldn't have to be like that. A mother shouldn't have to ask a daughter to
sneak her something. She should be able to have a doctor oversee her medication."
Osgoode Hall law Prof. Alan Young, who represents Harichy, said she shouldn't feel bad.
Although her case wasn't a landmark, she helped pressure the federal government to take a
more "accommodating and sensitive position" on medicinal marijuana.
But how much longer is it going to take to show that new-found sensitivity to all
people with an illness that can be eased by marijuana?
The government must move faster on its trials of medicinal marijuana.
And while that's moving ahead, it must quickly clear up the 90 or so backlogged
applications for an exemption like the one Harichy is seeking.
Many of Young's clients are sick people -- many of them dying --
who are forced to break the law to get relief. If they're caught, as the law stands now,
they're criminals. They have to waste their precious time defending themselves when they
should be living out their days with dignity.
Surely, Canada can do better.
Copyright: 1999 The London Free Press a division of Sun Media Corporation.
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