UK medical cannabis to be legal: is recreational use next?

Medical cannabis is to be made available on prescription on the NHS, after the government bowed to pressure from the public, the medical profession and even some in its own party.

What has changed?

The Home Office has announced that from the autumn, doctors will be able to prescribe marijuana-derived medicine.

The Home Secretary, Sajid Javid, said: “Following advice from two sets of independent advisers, I have taken the decision to reschedule cannabis-derived medicinal products – meaning they will be available on prescription”.

“This will help patients with an exceptional clinical need” he added.

Why has it changed?

In his statement, Javid admitted that “recent cases involving sick children made it clear to me that our position on cannabis-related medicinal products was not satisfactory”.

Calls for a change to British laws on medicinal drugs were amplified last month by the case of Billy Caldwell, a severely epileptic 12-year-old whose cannabis oil medication was confiscated by customs officers.

It drew condemnation from the public, pro-drug campaigners and doctors, and prompted the government to review whether the law should be changed.

What is the evidence for medical cannabis?

An initial review by Dame Sally Davies, the UK’s chief medical adviser, concluded there is evidence medicinal cannabis has therapeutic benefits.

The Advisory Council on the Misuse of Drugs, which carried out the second part of the review, last week said doctors should be able to prescribe medicinal cannabis provided products meet safety standards.

It recommended cannabis-derived medicinal products should be placed in Schedule 2 of the Misuse of Drugs Regulations 2001, meaning it can be administered to a patient by a doctor or dentist.

According to The Independent cannabis had previously been classed as a Schedule 1 drug, “meaning it was thought to have no therapeutic value but can be used for the purposes of research with a Home Office licence”.

Is this a step towards recreational legalisation?

Javid has been quick to stress the government decision was “in no way a first step to the legalisation of cannabis for recreational use”.

That means possession of the class B drug will still carry an unlimited fine and up to five years in jail, with dealers facing up to 14 years in prison.

Yet calls for complete legalisation are growing, even in the most unlikely of quarters.

In an article for The Daily Telegraph last month, the former Conservative leader William Hague called for the legalisation of cannabis for recreational use. He said the war on the drug had been “irreversibly lost” and a change of policy was needed.

Licensing cannabis for medical use would be a “step forward”, he said, but the Conservatives should be as “bold” as Canada, which recently voted to legalise cannabis for recreational use.

The Lib Dems and Greens have long advocated for the full legalisation of cannabis. Shadow home secretary Diane Abbott recently described the on drugs as a failure, but ruled out a Labour government legalising cannabis.