Save Romania Union (USR) MP Emanuel Ungureanu declared on Wednesday that the Ministry of Health and other state authorities say that medical cannabis treatments cannot be authorized in Romania because it would encourage recreational cannabis consumption, creating an „absolutely aberrant” but „intentional” confusion.
„After five years, patients in Romania who receive treatment with medicinal cannabis abroad are told that in 25 countries in the world, in Europe, including America, treatment with medicinal cannabis is possible, but in our country it is not possible. (…) The Ministry of Health and the other state authorities, which do not control anything in the area of drugs, which do not control anything in the area of ethnobotany, synthetic plants, inventions that harm children and young people, tell us that this medical part of cannabis that is authorized everywhere in the world is not possible in our country because it would encourage recreational cannabis consumption, creating an absolutely aberrant, but intentional, confusion. Rather than offering health alternatives for patients with serious illnesses through medicinal cannabis, we are better off saying ‘it’s not true, that it is a gateway for drugs, that we are bringing drugs into the country’,” Ungureanu said after the meeting of the Health Committee of the Chamber of Deputies in which the draft law on the legal regime of the cannabis plant, substances and preparations containing cannabis, used for medical purposes was debated.
The USR deputy also said that „Romania is full of drugs” even now, when medicinal cannabis is not authorized.
„In civilized countries, the introduction of medicinal cannabis for 10 years has not increased the rate of drugs, it has not increased the rate of those who used it recreationally. There are two completely distinct things – recreational drugs and medicinal cannabis. Unfortunately, I repeat, a bill initiated by the PSD, which was supported by all parties, is destroyed by this inertia and this negativism of the Ministry of Health, which would rather say no than say yes for patients”, he said.
Emanuel Ungureanu added that medicinal cannabis products are used for pain therapy in the terminal phase of the disease.
The draft law on the legal regime of the cannabis plant, substances and preparations containing cannabis, used for medical purposes was initiated in 2019 by a group of parliamentarians from PSD, PNL and non-affiliated parties.
AGERPRES
