Medicinal cannabis adverts will soon be banned in Jersey as part of a wider clampdown, with health leaders warning that the island’s current system has led to unsafe prescribing, increased psychiatric admissions, and a “black market in prescription drugs”.
Mental Health Director Andy Weir said today that “anecdotal evidence” from service users suggested that “quite a lot” of medicinal cannabis is being sold in the island.
“Significant increase” in patients requiring admission
Addressing a panel of politicians responsible for scrutinising health policies, he also raised concerns about prescribing practices for islanders with with serious mental illness amid “notable increase” in inpatient mental health admissions for in those prescribed large amounts of medicinal cannabis.
“We’re seeing a significant increase in mental health patients that are requiring admission acutely – for example, to Orchard Ward – who have been using large amounts of prescribed cannabis prior to that admission,” Mr Weir explained.
He also told the Health Scrutiny Panel that there are “significant concerns” about the volume of cannabis being prescribed and the nature of those prescriptions, particularly for people with known serious mental illnesses.
“People with psychotic illness, for example, are becoming unwell more quickly – and perhaps more unwell – because they’re utilising cannabis instead of prescribed medicines,” he said.
The Mental Health Director also raised concerns about risks of increased psychotic symptoms, especially in young people.
“There’s really good evidence around young people and the use of cannabis when brains are developing that shows that that high volumes of cannabis can significantly lead to psychotic symptoms,” he said.
“So we’re seeing people that are struggling anyway, who are just struggling more because of the prescribing of medicinal cannabis.”
Jersey too swift to legalise medical cannabis?
Health Minister Tom Binet echoed these concerns.
“I have some concerns about the extent of cannabis consumption on the island, albeit that I believe that everything that’s being done is being done in accordance with the regulations that we’ve got at the moment,” he said.
But Deputy Binet suggested Jersey was “swift to legalise medical cannabis without making sure that we’ve done all the homework to regulate it properly”.
But the panel was told that work is underway to address some of these issues.
Mr Weir explained that work is underway to allow medicinal cannabis prescribers to access the health records of the patients they are prescribing too.
“Sometimes people may go and be seen by a prescriber for medicinal cannabis and not declare that they have a serious mental illness, but access to the primary care record should help with that,” he said.
Deputy Binet noted that currently, “nobody’s got any oversight” of cannabis prescriptions, and a patient could potentially “go to a range of outlets without anybody knowing what anybody else has prescribed.”
“These services are unregulated”
A recent medicinal cannabis audit found evidence that some patients had been receiving prescriptions from two or more prescribers in the same month.
However, Health officers warned in today’s hearing that the data collection method used in the audit was not precise, as there are no unique identifying numbers for patients. As a result, assumptions were made based on name records.
The Mental Health Director said that work is also underway regarding “potential regulation” of the medicinal cannabis industry by the Jersey Care Commission.
“The biggest challenge that I have is that these services are unregulated,” he said.
Ads “will no longer be legal”
Plans to prohibit the the advertising of prescribed medicines – including medicinal cannabis – were also announced at the hearing.
Ruth Johnson, Director of Health Policy, explained: “We’re currently working on an advertising order which will prohibit the advertising of prescribed medicines.
“When you arrive at Jersey Airport at the moment, you see big adverts for medicinal cannabis.
“Once the advertising order is made, these will no longer be legal.”
Follow Express for updates…