Fiona Nash (NSW, National Party, Deputy Leader of the Nationals) Share this | Hansard source

I thank the senator for his question and for some advance notice of it. The changes that the coalition government made last year were in response to concerns out in the community around access to medicinal cannabis. I think they have been very positive changes, and they certainly have been well received. What the government has done is provide the missing piece to the puzzle, if you like, in ensuring that we have a domestic supply of medicinal cannabis, and that was what was missing prior to the changes that were brought in last year. Previously that lack of availability of therapeutically approved medicinal cannabis had been a real barrier to people who were accessing treatment.

In response to the senator, the health minister's office advises that the medicines that are traditionally used in the Special Access Scheme category A are unregistered products that are generally unregistered overseas, have been subjected to a full safety, quality and efficacy assessment, and come with product information that allows the medical practitioner to assess the risk of any adverse effects and manage drug interactions and dose response matters. They are not available for unregistered medicinal cannabis products. So it is then appropriate, and people would expect, that there be some form of clinical oversight from the general practitioners when choosing to use unregistered medicinal cannabis products. Under Special Access Scheme category B, under which these products are approved, where the doctor can justify their clinical decision to prescribe that medicinal cannabis product, I am advised that approval can be given in as little as two days. So, even under the current requirements, there can be a very quick approval process from the TGA so people are able to access those products.