Olivier Véran in favor of extending medical cannabis trials to French Polynesia

Olivier Véran, who was appointed Minister of Health this weekend to replace Agnès Buzyn, will not need any time to get up to speed on the issue of medical cannabis in France. He was, in fact, the driving force behind the medical cannabis pilot program and is the originator of the the inclusion of his amendment in the 2020 Budget Act.

In response to a question from his former colleague, Polynesian MP Moetai Brotherson, who asked him about the possibility of extending the metropolitan pilot program for medical cannabis to French Polynesia, Olivier Véran responded favorably «in principle» via a handwritten note.

«Dear Moetai. I’ll pass this along to my staff—it’s a good idea. We’ll just need to determine how many potential beneficiaries there are among the five indications selected for the pilot program. But in principle, of course.»

Moetai Brotherson explains on his Facebook Regarding his project: “I will now be working with his office, with L’Arass [Regulatory Agency for Health and Social Services, ed.], and the Ministry of Health of French Polynesia on the details of this expansion.”

He also notes that he had contacted Agnès Buzyn’s office several times regarding the same matter, but received no response from her.

Moetai Brotherson would also like to help Polynesian patients benefit from local expertise in cannabis cultivation, without having to import medical cannabis from major metropolitan or foreign suppliers.

He thus confides to Tahiti News : «The trial is expected to last until 2022, but we already need to start thinking about what comes next. I say this with regret because I’d like to avoid it, but that’s what’s on the horizon. Given that everything grows exceptionally well in Polynesia and we have people who know how to cultivate it very well, what I’d like to avoid is that, once medical cannabis is legalized, we’ll be forced to import either cannabis or cannabis-based products because local production conditions won’t meet the standards required by the regulatory framework for legalization after the pilot program. That’s the direction we’re heading in right now.”

As for the distribution model, Moetai Brotherson is considering the possibility of Cannabis Social Clubs: «If we want to offer alternatives to this monopolization of the sector by major players outside of Polynesia, we need to understand how they operate. For example, in Uruguay, they have Cannabis Social Clubs. These are associations registered as such with the Ministry of Health. They can have a maximum of 40 members who pool their resources. Members pay a monthly fee and benefit from communal cultivation and product processing, which are guaranteed by the association. Members therefore come to these Cannabis Social Clubs to get their supplies, and nowhere else.»