Oireachtas Joint and Select Committees

Wednesday, 29 September 2021

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Health

Medical Cannabis Access Programme Update: Discussion

Mr. Shaun Flanagan:

In the lead-up to the introduction of the legislation, HIQA did some work for the Department. It is important to flag that since the legislation was published, there has been a significant change in the market, in that there is now a licensed medicine, Epidiolex, for epilepsy indication. It is going through the standard HSE medicines pricing and assessment process.

In other words, a licensed medicine very similar to the CannEpil product is going through the pricing and reimbursement process. I cannot give any guarantee because I cannot make a decision until the process is complete. If it gets to the reimbursement list, it will obviously have an impact on the number of patients who might use the MCAP in the epilepsy indication in particular.