Danny Healy-Rae (Kerry, Independent) | Oireachtas source

I thank the Tánaiste. I agree with him that consultants and doctors have the knowledge but they are prevented from signing the applications because it looks like they are not indemnified by the HSE and that liability will fall to them. Time is not on the side of many of these patients. I am asking the Government to do something, by statutory instrument or whatever, to allow the consultants and doctors to sign the applications. Doctors prescribe medicine. They will not prescribe an item that remains a Schedule 1 banned substance. It needs to be rescheduled to Schedule 4, in order that doctors would be prescribing a designated medicine. The time and effort required to make a single application, let alone a consultant having to apply for multiple patients, is logistically impossible. In the interim, the Government can bring in all the laws and legislation it wants but it should do something and sign some statutory instrument to allow this medicinal cannabis to be obtained. I am not looking for cannabis for any reason other than medicinal purposes to be administrated through our chemists and doctors.

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