Medical Marijuana is Finally Legal in Ireland — and Insurance Covers It, Too
By Zach Harris 28 th June 2019 “Merry Jane”
Another nation joins the global green rush!
Ireland residents suffering from cancer,
multiple sclerosis, and epilepsy can soon treat
their ailments with legal cannabis.
Forget four-leafed clovers. There’s a new
emerald-green good luck charm coming to
Ireland: legal cannabis. Unlike state-specific legalisation programs in
the US, Harris said that patients in the
forthcoming Irish medical cannabis program
will be covered by insurance.
This week, Irish Health Minister Simon
Harris signed legislation beginning a five-
year medical marijuana pilot program that
will span the entire country.
Once established, the program will import
cannabis products from companies outside of
Ireland, and empower local doctors and
pharmacists to prescribe the plant for a select
number of serious ailments. Harris said that Ireland would hopefully move
to license local cannabis growers to supply
products to the government-backed program,
but that in the first years of operation, the
country will license the import of marijuana
from other European nations with relaxed
cannabis laws.
"The purpose of this program is to facilitate
compassionate access to cannabis for medical
reasons, where conventional treatment has
failed,” Harris said during a press conference
announcing
the
medical
marijuana
legalization law, The Journal reported
Wednesday.
After a regulatory and licensing period that
Harris predicts will be finished by the fall,
Irish residents suffering from epilepsy,
multiple sclerosis, and nausea or vomiting
associated with chemotherapy will be able to
consult a physician or pharmacist to access
THC and CBD products in the same way they
would other prescriptions.
“Ultimately, it will be the decision of the
medical consultant, in consultation with their
patient, to prescribe a particular treatment,
including a cannabis-based treatment, for a
patient under their care,” Harris detailed,
adding, “You will be assessed [financially] on
the same basis – if you get the drug payment
scheme you will be covered in that, if you
have the medical card, you’ll be covered
under the prescription charges, if you are on
long-term illness, you will be covered under
that.”
Despite the ground-breaking step in cannabis
reform for Ireland, Harris also made it
abundantly clear that the medical program
was not a stepping stone to full-scale
recreational legalisation.
“It is important to state that there are no plans
to legalise cannabis in this country,” Harris
told reporters.
Ireland’s medical marijuana pilot program
will run unimpeded by the health minister for
the next five years, and will be reassessed in
2024.
https://merryjane.com/news/medical-marijuana-is-
finally-legal-in-ireland-
—-and-insurance-
covers-it-too