Posts by Russell Brown
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Hard News: Friday Music: Magnificent melancholy, in reply to TracyMac,
Ours was actually a micro home theatre system and took CDs in a DVD drive that was achingly slow to scan and start playing. It had an old 30-pin iDevice dock but, of course, no HDMI.
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Hard News: Approved by lunchtime, in reply to BenWilson,
Yes, just as the Minister of Magic should probably be a wizard.
I'd never thought about this before, but you're right.
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Hard News: Approved by lunchtime, in reply to Sacha,
So her oncologist wasn’t well-enough informed to realise that Sativex would not do what she wanted? A system that relies on that group of practitioners for information won’t work then. Imagine if there was a national health organisation that hired researchers and policy people ..
For the system, Sativex's overwhelming virtue is that it's an approved, pharmaceutical-grade medicine, so it's easy to say yes to. And they did want to say yes. I knew that Stewart Jessamine had called Helen to try and interest her in applying for Sativex instead, and we now know that ministry officials had considerable contact with Falkov along the same lines. It's not hard to imagine how he might say yes.
There were problems with the product Helen wanted to use, but I don't think the answer is to try and persuade her to ask for another product that might not do the job but is convenient for the system. It would be better to create a register of products that met basic assay requirements, even if they're not pharmaceutical-grade. That, least, would stop people wasting their time applying for approval for products that have no chance of approval.
There's a broader need to develop some competence in this area, if only so that the thousands of people self-medicating have access to good advice.
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Background on the communications between the MoH and Helen Kelly's oncologist.
It's interesting, but the vibe is it was offered to the journalist because it makes the ministry look better.
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Hard News: Approved by lunchtime, in reply to chris fowlie,
While CBD is in the Medicines Act, that only covers therapeutic use, not non-therapeutic use. I have written to the Ministry of Health seeking their confirmation this is the case.
Ah, interesting.
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Hard News: Approved by lunchtime, in reply to Sofie Bribiesca,
More thoughts from the Labour Party
“It’s about accepting there is enough medical evidence around now that under proper or appropriate supervision from a GP or specialist that this isn’t a form of treatment that ought to go through a series of hoops to get a ministerial sign-off.”
They've got it right!
It seems especially the case here. This should be a one-time product approval by Medsafe. There's no reason to make every use a matter of ministerial approval.
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Hard News: Approved by lunchtime, in reply to Ross Bell,
CBD is regulated under Medicines Act
I thought it might be. But the MoH page on medical cannabis doesn’t quote the Medicines Act, it quotes the Misuse of Drugs Act.
And the Medicines regulations list it as a “prescription medicine”. Am I right in seeing a dubious basis for making it subject to ministerial approval, when it’s not a “cannabis preparation” under the MoDA?
Or to put it another way, why is ministerial approval required for a drug already regulated as a prescription medicine?
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Hard News: Approved by lunchtime, in reply to Bart Janssen,
Meanwhile it’s sad that the bureaucrats are all so risk averse. It seems like everyone in the chain is completely paranoid about making any call. And that means the only person willing to make a decision is the minister who is extremely unlikely to have the depth of knowledge of the people below him or her.
To be fair, the regulations stipulate that it’s a decision for the minister, although in the case of Sativex applications are delegated to ministry officials.
Dunne’s position is quite politically precarious and although he doesn’t have to follow the recommendations of officials, it’s a given that he generally will.
What annoys me is the use of this approval to declare “See? The system works!” when, although this application was clearly in better order than that from Helen Kelly oncologist, none of the problems with the approval criteria have been fixed. At all.
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Because of the way I work – I’m semi-allergic to offices – I’ve definitely done my share of parenting. There have been many extra demands as part of being an autism parent.
But what your Dad said applies to all of us – for us home-office workers it’s all too easy to be consumed by what you do and not break that and focus on the kid in front of you.
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Thanks for sharing this Rob.
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