Peruvians are struggling to have access to cannabis-based products

In 2017, a law for the medicinal use of cannabis was approved in Peru. Furthermore, in 2019 its regulations were approved for the benefit of thousands of patients. This Andean country has thousands of pharmacies in its territory, but to date, only a small one, located in the capital, can sell cannabis-based products.

Giving permits to one single pharmacy when there are so many, and in a country with 32 million inhabitants, is almost like denying access to medical cannabis. In addition, the situation worsens if you consider that you can hardly buy cannabis oil, only one of the various medicinal products that can be obtained from the plant.

Francesca Brivio is the Executive President of the Cannabis Gotas de Esperanza organization. As an activist for the medicinal use of cannabis and as a patient beneficiary, she denounces this deficiency.

“The law talks about the use of cannabis and its derivatives, but the Ministry of Health and the General Directorate of Medicines, Supplies, and Drugs [Digemid] treat the issue as if they were only talking about cannabis oil when, as patients, we need to use it in other ways: topical route, respiratory route, in addition to pills, vaginal ovules, etc., and for various types of ailments.”

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The distribution of cannabis in Peru is only reduced to cannabis oil

Thus, the use of medical cannabis in Peru is almost non-existent within the formal system because not only is its distribution limited, but this limited distribution is only reduced to a single derivative: the oil.

Brivio denounces that the procedures in Digemid to allow the importation of medical cannabis can take months and, although she hopes that soon other pharmacies will have a license to sell other cannabis-based products and not just the oil, she considers this possibility to be unreliable.

“I have the impression that Digemid and the Ministry of Health have allowed the sale in a single pharmacy to be able to tell patients that they cannot complain because in Peru cannabis is available, in one place, but it is available,” said the activist.

Faced with reasons for distrusting the political will to bring the medicinal uses of a stigmatized plant closer together, Brivio is fighting for what she calls “the three access routes”:

• self-cultivation;
• collective cultivation;
• the sale of part of the laboratories.

The organization she represents accepts any way out, although she relies more on self-cultivation.

“We are always going to need self-cultivation because it is enough for a patient to need cannabis for other medical reasons than that offered by pharmacies for him to claim the use he needs, and that person cannot be denied the right to health,” said Brivio.

For those who live in Lima, the reality is known: in the capital of Peru, getting cannabis is as easy as getting bread. However, that may be a sufficient reality for those seeking the recreational effects of cannabis, but not at all for those who depend on cannabis for health reasons.

In this sense, Brivio and the thousands of needy patients do not want to go to the illegal market because, like everything that is outside the law, the product they can buy lacks regulations, supervision, or health security.

This medical plant has been stigmatized as a harmful drug

Despite this manifest claim by patients, they have to deal with the suspicions aroused by a plant that has been socially stigmatized as a harmful drug, and only as that.

“There is also the argument of those who say:” I don’t know if you are going to buy cannabis to get high or to cure yourself,” but the same could be said when someone buys glue: that it is not known if it is going to be used to glue a shoe or to inhale it, or if we go further in that logic, then that knives are not sold because it is not known if they will be used to kill someone or to cut bread,” said Brivio, disarming suspicions about the use of cannabis.

The truth is that patients exist and medicinal use is not only supported by science but also accepted by the Peruvian State.

In this way, and seeking extensive access to all who need it, Cannabis Gotas de Esperanza has partnered with the Federation of Medicinal Cannabis of Peru (Fecame) and they have prepared a preliminary project to allow the self-cultivation of the plant that is, ensured Brivio, the most reliable way to have quality cannabis, since no one like you can assure you have the most appropriate plant for your needs, organic or free of pesticides, for example; something that the illegal market cannot offer.

For now, they affirm that they have obtained the support of 6 congressmen from various banks to present the draft before the Health Commission and, if all goes well, it will be sent the plenary session for debate.

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(Featured image by Hanf garten via Unsplash)

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First published in Sputnik, a third-party contributor translated and adapted the article from the original. In case of discrepancy, the original will prevail.

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