Oireachtas Joint and Select Committees

Thursday, 19 September 2024

Committee on Drugs Use

Decriminalisation, Depenalisation, Diversion and Legalisation of Drugs: Discussion (Resumed)

9:30 am

Dr. Denis O'Driscoll:

Correct. In England, for example, prior to the UK's departure from the EU, it introduced a measure whereby persons could walk into a pharmacy and get the drug without a prescription. Anyone could access it that way. Ideally, that is the way the product would be able to be accessed, but there is a stepwise process. This is beyond my scope but it is within the territory of the Irish Medicines Board, the HPRA and the organisations that have the product licence on the market because they have to go through a stepwise certain process to have that happen.