I would like to clarify a few issues regarding the Health Canada Medicinal Marihuana Access Regulations ( MMAR ) program.

Physicians do not "prescribe pot." Every Canadian citizen qualifies automatically for MMAR if they meet the Health Canada criteria-anyone providing evidence of a qualifying condition, and/or anyone who's been to a specialist for their condition. This has nothing to do with the doctor's views on the matter-patients either qualify or they do not.

Doctors authorize for MMAR by filling out forms declaring that the patient has the condition. This automatically authorizes the patient to possess and grow marihuana. The patient instructs the doctor as to the daily quantity and method by which they consume marihuana. This is much different than a physician prescribing a medication-where the doctor instructs the patient.

The July 2011 raid was significant not only because it netted five arrests for suspected drug production but because it was the culmination of three years of lobbying the federal government to make illegal the possession of chemicals used to produce methamphetamine and ecstasy.

That chance 2007 meeting on the Bowen Island ferry between John Weston, now MP for West Vancouver-Sunshine Coast-Sea to Sky Country, and Cpl. Richard De Jong of the North Vancouver RCMP had all the makings of a Hollywood screenplay:

An aspiring young politician promises a veteran street cop he'll take the gloves off law enforcement to help them fight street-drug manufacturers if he's sent to the capital. "He offered to give me a legal education on illegal drugs," Weston told The Outlook, "knowing that I might be elected and knowing that he was right that I perhaps needed an education on something that was so important to young people and to families in the riding I now represent."

A promise kept: Weston goes to Ottawa and Cpl. De Jong's plea is echoed in the country's highest halls of power. But the barriers of bureaucracy went up and the new anti-drug bill that seemed a slam dunk for Weston became a lengthy battle of attrition with fellow politicians and lawmakers.

Dr. Mark Tyndall, chief of infectious diseases at the Ottawa Hospital, says he thinks this is a very important decision. “I expected this, but not with a unanimous vote,” he says. “Not only does this decision mean the clinic should be open, but it makes drug addiction a health issue, not a criminal justice issue.”

Health authority calls plan an extension of other harm reduction programs

A new pilot project to supply free pipes to crack cocaine users in the Downtown Eastside hasn’t even begun but is already sparking a lot of attention. Federal Justice Minister Rob Nicholson lashed out last week at the initiative by Vancouver Coastal Health, which will begin distributing new crack pipes sometime this fall as part of its provincially funded harm reduction strategy.

Gavin Wilson, the health authority’s director of public affairs, doesn’t see anything controversial about the plan, which is expected to cost between $50,000 and $60,000.

A group of neighbours are understandably concerned and have signed a petition, opposing the home.

Addiction raises all sorts of fears of the unknown and visions of trembling, disheveled drug addicts descending en masse onto a helpless family-oriented neighbourhood. But it's worth remembering that recovering addicts are far away from addicts.

The women who will be living in the house have battled addiction and are in a recovery mode, using the home as a final step in getting their lives back on track.

Turning Point, which will lease the facility from the city, has been a flashpoint for controversy in the community over the past 12 years.

Its first facility, a nine-bed group home on Odlin Road, opened in 1999 to hysterical opposition. There were claims drug dealers would take over the area and property values would plummet.

On the final day of Parliament last March just before the federal election, a rookie Conservative MP from British Columbia pulled off a rare feat for a backbencher – he got a law passed.

John Weston won unanimous support in the House for a private member’s bill that comes into force Thursday. It is an amendment to the Controlled Drugs and Substances Act that police hope will help them in what so far has been a losing battle against the illegal manufacture of methamphetamines and ecstasy. <

“People were calling for something to end the scourge of crystal meth and ecstasy,” said Mr. Weston, who has supported drug-rehab programs in the Vancouver area. “The more I learned, the more I realized this was something really important.”

The new law for the first time makes it a crime to possess the tools of synthetic drug production – anything from chemicals to pill presses – if it can be proven they were intended for making illegal drugs.

Far more people come out of detox than there are beds at the next stage in the recovery process -the stabilization unit.

"They're bound to relapse," she says. "They aren't treated. All they are is detoxed."

Gaping holes in medical service delivery for addicts and alcoholics have been identified in repeated studies on addiction, including Victoria's 2007 Breaking the Cycle of Mental Illness, Addictions and Homelessness, and the 2009 B.C. Medical Association report Stepping Forward: Improving Addiction Care in British Columbia.

The BCMA recommended that 600 more treatment beds be opened by 2012, and service gaps eliminated.

"Whether in a detoxification centre, an emergency room or their own homes, individuals often make the choice to seek treatment only to be confronted with obstacles, a lack of space, a wait list with no certain date of entry, and even unanswered phone calls," the report said.

Now, Oregon and Mississippi have mostly wiped out meth labs through a simple law change: requiring prescriptions for cold remedies containing pseudoephedrine. Oregon's new law was written chiefly by district attorney Rob Bovett. In a recent commentary, he wrote:

"The latest bad news from the world of methamphetamine is that makers of the drug have perfected a one-pot recipe that enables them to manufacture their highly addictive product while on the move, often in their car. The materials they need - a two-liter soda bottle, a few cold pills and some household chemicals - are easily obtained and easily discarded, often in a trash bag dumped along the highway."

Bovett said America's meth madness flared after 1976, when the U.S. Food and Drug Administration allowed cold remedies containing pseudoephedrine nasal decongestant to be sold over the counter, "inadvertently letting the genie out of the bottle. Afterward, the meth epidemic spread across the nation, leaving destroyed lives and families in its wake."

The bill would allow the province to monitor prescription narcotics and other controlled substances, from painkillers to stimulants and sedatives.

Currently, the province only tracks drugs prescribed under a public program that funds medications for seniors, welfare recipients and the disabled.

The bill will expand that database, and issue an alert if someone tries to get the same drugs from different doctors or tries to fill a prescription at several pharmacies.

It would also identify doctors and pharmacists who are prescribing or dispensing too many drugs, which could lead to police stepping in.

Long-term use of the drug can lead to devastating medical, psychological and social consequences, including mood disturbances, violent behavior, an increased risk of contracting infectious diseases such as HIV/AIDS and hepatitis and higher rates of crime, unemployment and child abuse and neglect.

It can also result in a uniquely accelerated form of extensive dental disease known as "meth mouth."

Across all fronts, the economic cost of methamphetamine use in the U.S. reached a staggering $23.4 billion in 2005, according to the RAND Corp., but that doesn't even begin to account for the personal cost in the form of human pain and suffering.

So who should be on the front lines fighting the disease? Emergency room physicians? Law enforcement personnel? How about dentists?