After a six-year battle, a campaigner is thought to be the first endometriosis patient to be granted a ministerial licence for cannabis treatment in Ireland.
Irish cannabis campaigner, Aimee Brown, says her consultant’s application to the Minister of Health to prescribe the treatment for her legally has been successful.
Around 70 people are currently thought to be accessing cannabis under the ministerial licence scheme in Ireland and Aimee believes she is the first endometriosis patient permitted do so.
It comes after six years of fighting for a medical cannabis prescription, whilst being forced to obtain her medication illicitly.
Medical cannabis access in Ireland
In Ireland there are currently two routes to accessing medicinal cannabis legally.
The Medical Cannabis Access Programme (MCAP) which has been active since early last year allows ‘compassionate access’ to cannabis medicines.
However, it only offers access to a limited number of cannabis-based medicines to people living with one of three qualifying conditions, where other treatments have failed. These include intractable nausea and vomiting associated with chemotherapy, severe treatment-resistant epilepsy and spasticity associated with multiple sclerosis (MS).
Campaigners, including Aimee, have been critical of the fact that the scheme does not include chronic pain, a condition which is thought to affect over 1.5 million citizens.
The ministerial licence scheme allows a patient’s specialist doctor or GP to apply for a licence to prescribe. If successful it is the responsibility of the patient and their doctor to source the medication, the majority of which is thought to come from the Transvaal pharmacy in the Netherlands.
Speaking in Irish Dáil [parliament] in July, Health Minister Stephen Donnelly said 40 people were accessing cannabis through the ministerial licence scheme.
Leader of the People Before Profit party, Gino Kenny TD, now believes this number to be around 70. In addition, an estimated 30 people are enrolled on the MCAP.
Cannabis and endometriosis
Aimee was diagnosed with endometriosis in her 20s but has lived with symptoms since childhood, with her first hospital admission at the age of eight.
The inflammatory condition causes cells similar to those lining the womb to grow elsewhere in the body and react to changing hormones in the menstrual cycle, a process which can cause a wide range of symptoms, including debilitating pain.
Earlier this year Aimee, now 30, told Cannabis Health how cannabis helps manage the pain caused by both endometriosis and adenomyosis, a separate condition (which often goes hand in hand) in which the inner lining of the uterus breaks through the muscle wall.
She has been forced to obtain cannabis illegally in Ireland for several years, facing stigma from friends, family and medical professionals, including one who suggested she ‘emigrate’ if she wanted to medicate with cannabis.
Aimee was diagnosed with endometriosis in her 20s.
‘This is for every young girl’
Receiving the news that her licence application had been successful, Aimee acknowledged other women who have been ‘dismissed, disbelieved and disregarded’.
“I’ve had family and friends over the years shame me, stigmatise me and think less of me for consuming cannabis but I always held my values strong and my head high. I knew it was medicine,” she told Cannabis Health.
“It is the only consistency I’ve had through years of physical and emotional agony, but all the while I risked a jail sentence. Finally, I can now consume without fear of the police raiding my parents’ home, without fear of losing my driving licence, without fear of possible prosecution.”
Aimee, who says she has been inundated with messages from other women asking how they might be able to obtain a prescription, continued: “This is not just for me. It’s for every young girl who’s been dismissed, disbelieved and disregarded.
“The hard truth is, it’s taken me over six years to get here. My first pain consultant, who I waited for five years to see, told me to ‘emigrate’ if I chose to use cannabis.
“Thankfully, another pain consultant heard me out and agreed to try to apply for the licence if I tried his procedures first. He stuck to his word and agreed to apply after three failed procedures didn’t help.”
Increasing costs
However, the cost of Aimee’s medication is set to more than double on prescription, increasing from €400 to €1000 per month.
While this is a ‘small price to pay’, she says, for ‘freedom and peace of mind’, Aimee is among those calling for cannabis to be included on the Drugs Payment Scheme, which caps the amount a patient has to pay for their medication each month at €80.
“The next step is to implore our government to include cannabis prescription on the drugs payment scheme and have a maximum capped price per month, an affordable and realistic price,” she added.
“I’m saving the state a lot of money each month by not needing all the prescription drugs such as opioids which I used to get. I hope they will see sense soon.”
Aimee is also fundraising to travel abroad to have surgery for her endometriosis, you can donate here .
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