A Bermudian patient was last year granted permission to legally bring cannabinoid oil to the Island for cancer treatment, according to former Health Minister Patricia Gordon- Pamplin.

During a debate on the recently released Cannabis Reform Collaborative Report on Friday, the MP told the House of Assembly that as Health Minister she had approved permission to bring in cannabinoid oil for a cancer patient after being approached by the patient’s family.

“As the Minister of Health, it fell upon me to decide whether I was going to approve the importation of cannabinoid oil,” she said.

“There were hoops and bells and whistles that had to be overcome in order to make that decision, and while the legislation says no, this is illegal, it cannot be imported, I looked at it from a perspective that if there was any way that there was a possibility to allow this individual to have the cannabinoid oil that was going to give him comfort, there’s no way, as the Minister of Health, I was going to block it.

“I signed off to approve it, as I believe any person with good conscious would have done, because under those circumstances I was not prepared to be the one to play God, to decide whether someone’s comfort was going to be yes or no at my pen. And I decided that if his doctor decided it was appropriate, his family decided it was appropriate and he himself decided that this was giving him comfort, then there’s no way I could do anything other than support that.”

She said the system at the time required the support of the Chief Medical Officer, the police department and Customs in order to bring the oil into Bermuda for the patient.

Ms Gordon-Pamplin said the patient was eventually able to get the oil, and while he has since died, she was grateful that he was able to receive a modicum of comfort in his final days.

St David’s MP Suzann Holshouser said one of the challenges regarding medical marijuana in Bermuda was properly educating local doctors in its usage. She told the House that while two doctors had approved the use of the cannabinoid oil in the case mentioned by Ms Gordon-Pamplin, neither had been willing to administer it to the patient.

“The rules are there and you can do it, but you have to have two doctors here and they have to be willing to give it to the patient,” she said.

“So here we have the ability through legislation, through hard work and determination from different ministries, to get it here and then you get a doctor that says ‘I’m afraid, because what will this do to my licence if it’s not legal?’”

Independent MP Terry Lister said yesterday: “Given the fact that the medical profession sees benefit from patients suffering from some specific ailments being treated by the use of medical marijuana, I believe this treatment should be made available to all those patients whose doctors recommend it.

“I fully support marinol, a marijuana derivative, or a similar derivative being administered either by the patient’s doctor or by staff at King Edward VII Memorial Hospital.”