1st Conference on Therapeutic use of cannabis in Figueres (Part 1 of 4)

Transcript of the presentation of the Conference :

Ramon Camps, from Alchimia Solidària Foundation

Hello, hello... Good night everybody. For those who don't know us, we are David Saulina and Ramon Camps, president and vice president of the Alchimia Solidària Foundation... First of all, we would like to thank you for being here and excuse Dr. Mariano García de Palau, who hasn't been able to join us. He's ill today but perhaps he'll come to the second sessions, right?

This is the last event that we'll held in the framework of the celebration of Alchimia's 15 anniversary, and well, lots of positive things have happened during the past 15 years with regard to medical cannabis...

David Saulina, from Alchimia Solidària Foundation

Our shop...our shop has been visited by plenty of people who have found relief for their suffering and conditions. Cannabis may not be a miracle, but it can work better and with less side effects than the drugs prescribed by conventional medicine in some cases.

Back to our current reality, and after these 15 years, as Ramon was saying, things have changed drastically. And the best of all is that cannabis is starting to be on the place where it always should have been, which is the medicine cabinet of many people.

Despite cannabis is still illegal in some countries and it is difficult to access this medicine, scientific evidence is showing that the therapeutic properties of cannabis are evident, so it is clear that this should lead to a legalization of cannabis, in this case for medical purposes, but we hope also for recreational users.

Ramon Camps...

So, we are pleased to present you Oscar Parés, assistant director of ICEERS Foundation in Barcelona, and thank him for moderating this event, for volunteering to moderate the talks of Dr. Joan Parés and psychologist and Doctor in Pharmacology José Carlos Bouso...

David Saulina...

Also tell you that the absence of Dr. Mariano García de Palau, who was going to talk about a hot topic in the cannabis scene, CBD, will be covered by Dr. José Carlos Bouso, who is also an expert on pharmacology.

Well, thanks a lot for coming, thanks to all the doctors for accepting our invitation and for their talks, and that's all, Oscar if you wish to take the floor... thanks.

Oscar Parés, Deputy Director of ICEERS Foundation

Thanks David and Ramon. Let me start with a small confession, you know I'm feeling at home today, I've had the fortune of being asked to... me and our Foundation, the Foundation where I'm working, to collaborate in this event and sometimes you see it as a responsibility, but today I see it as a celebration and you'll soon understand why.

First, the person on my left, José Carlos Bouso, is a workmate and great friend for many years. Next to him on his left is Dr. Joan Parés, who is my father... and here at the first row I have my mother and my girlfriend, so I'm feeling at home.

Also, Ramon and David are like two cousins for us city people, we've been collaborating for a long time and always with very good vibes. Not only at personal level, but also through the institutions that each of us represent, and that's why we're here today. Because both Alchimia Foundation and ICEERS Foundation share objectives, specifically in the cannabis field, since it's been 3 years working together now, and whenever they organize some event we try to assist and vice versa... we know we can always count on their help and enthusiasm, which are highly appreciated.

So, today's event is not new in the sense that the debate on medical cannabis has concerned our society for a long time. We have more visibility every day, we are performing more talks in more important and cool places every day, just as today.

But there is still some type of contradiction in this story, which is that even if our knowledge on the benefits and prejudices of cannabis at scientific level increases, with more and more people using it, it seems like normalization at political and judicial level is not arriving. And that fact makes people, either those interested on cannabis or users, still feel stigmatized for using it, and that's why meeting, taking a look at it and discussing about it is so important.

Because, as you know, cannabis has been on the lists of international drug control treaties since 1961, where substances are listed according to their level of hazard, cannabis is in two of these lists, and one of them includes substances without medicinal value...that can't be used responsibly. It's still in those lists today so there is persecution, stigma, plenty of unfair situations. So this type of events can help us reverse this situation and play a part in achieving the desired political and institutional normalization of cannabis.

I'd like to focus on what has happened to cannabis users in Catalonia during last years, because it seems like we have some meeting points today, some knowledge that can be shared, it is still recent, right?...Somehow, the claim on the responsible use of cannabis, or adult use of cannabis, started back in the 70s.

We could actually say that in Barcelona it started in a small bookstore that some of you probably know, Makoki. Makoki was a bookstore where people from the counter-culture met, people fighting against Franco, with libertarian spirit, people who enjoyed the culture of comics, with "dark" cultural background... so that was a meeting point for both medical and recreational users to share and gain knowledge on homegrown cannabis, on the fact that cannabis is a plant with many properties and it wasn't until 1991, I mentioned the 70s before, but it was in 1991 when, also in Barcelona, the first association of cannabis users was founded, the Ramon Santos Cannabis Studies Association. Some of the people who met at Makoki were the founders of this association, and planted their first cannabis crop in 1994, a public crop. It was in Tarragona.

They went to the institutions, they notified it to the Mossos d'Esquadra, to the prosecutors office, to the courthouse... They said: "we want an exit from the black market, we want to know the origin of our pot. So they planted 200 plants.

When they were almost ripe, the Guardia Civil destroyed the crop without any warrant and these guys were taken to the judge. They won the trial at first instance at Tarragona Provincial Court, but after the prosecutor's appeal the case moved up to the Supreme Court. They were tried and found guilty by the Supreme Court in 1997.

They were fined and sentenced to prison terms, and even if the terms were not too long, all these old-timer activists who had been fighting since years ago were suddenly unable to grow their own pot, so they started to look at the different options available, especially in the private sector.

It was then that the first issue of Cáñamo magazine was published, the first of many magazines about cannabis printed in Spain. Actually, Spain is one of the places with more publications on cannabis. We have like 4 or 5 magazines...we had 7 or 8 once.

Some of them opened florist shops where cannabis seeds were sold...what we know today as Grow Shops.

The first one opened in 1999 in Barcelona's "Barrio Chino", today called Raval. It was called "El Interior"...Also, the first cannabis fair, Spannabis, was held in 2004, with almost 20 editions at this moment. Today, more than 30.000 people visit this event, which has become South Europe's greatest cannabis festival. All this is somehow connected, and also in 2001 something significant happened; as you may know, in Spain we've had a huge problem with heroin...a whole generation was trapped in that situation without any help from the Administration. Methadone treatments did not start until many years later, as well as needle exchange programmes, etc.

But during the 80s we had a large proportion of the population with HIV problems. The Junta de Andalucía, the government of Andalucia, was worried about this sector of the population so they requested a report from a group of Professors of Criminal Law at the University of Malaga. They told them: how could we treat these AIDS patients with cannabis? To make a palliative treatment for these people. And this group wrote a report where they explained a new way of accessing cannabis without committing any crime.
The Junta de Andalucía archived the document in a drawer, but these professors published it in a criminal law journal and some of those activists who were busy with their Grow Shops, magazines, fairs, etc. said "damn!". We have another door open to collective crops here...

So this text, which was originally requested by the Junta de Andalucía, ended up in the hands of activists and became the basis of Cannabis Social Clubs.

Already in 2001 the Barcelona Club of Cannabis Tasters was founded in Barcelona, in the city centre. It was also formed by the same people involved in previous experiences that we've already mentioned, and inaugurated the path of Cannabis Social Clubs.

As you know, these clubs are institutions that supply most patients looking for relief with cannabis...almost by accident, cannabis activists were serving people who went to their clubs for therapeutic reasons. I mean, all of a sudden that was the only option available for patients, although these are not places where patients should really... Cannabis Social Clubs can't meet all the needs of these people. We can't require any more from them for the moment.

This caused that, in 2001, an association of breast cancer patients, the Agatha Association from Barcelona, pushed - along with physicians like Dr. Laporte who is an institution in Catalonia - the Government of Catalonia to raise a petition where all the political parties from Catalonia requested a regulation of medical cannabis from the Government of Madrid.

This finally seemed a solution, or that the problems of patients were finally dignified...but if that happened in 2001 the reality is that today, 2016, the only progress made is that multiple sclerosis patients can access Sativex now, which is a medicine only accessible by a very specific type of patients.

Most people using cannabis for medical purposes - we'll hear them next - can't access this medicine, so they remain in a grey area, left on their own and being subject to contradictory information, to people who want to sell them products that they don't even know if they should be taking...In any case, it is a situation of vulnerability.

That's why we're here. To continue reducing this vulnerability, to educate, to give power to all these people, and to learn from the experts that we are lucky to see here today.

Well, without further delay, I'll give the floor to José Carlos. Dr. José Carlos Bouso comes from Madrid, although he's been working in Barcelona during past years. He works for the ICEERS Foundation...we're workmates as I already mentioned before.

He's Doctor in Pharmacology and one of the most experienced persons in Spain in regard with research on different psychoactive substances and... Well, you have 20 minutes to teach us what you want.

After that Joan will talk, and then we'll have a little debate with all of you, which is a very interesting moment.