NHS Authorises Unprecedented Cannabis Prescription
The NHS have finally prescribed a severely epileptic 15 year old boy from Northern Ireland with a full course of cannabis-based medication following 4 years of constant pressure from his mother. Billy Caldwell’s case has been covered extensively by the press for the past 2 years, but Ms Caldwell’s campaigning achieved no concrete results - until yesterday. In a landmark decision, Billy Caldwell was prescribed a lifelong supply of cannabis oil funded by the NHS, with his first bottle of medicine due to be delivered on the 1st November. It is a big achievement for the family and the result will open doors for thousands of other patients in a similar situation.
Ms Caldwell was overwhelmed by the news and told the i: “It’s been a long time coming, I can’t quite believe it. It means so much to us, it means everything. We’re delighted and relieved. This should now help other patients and families who’ve been campaigning for medicinal cannabis on the NHS.” She hopes it will help the thousands of patients who are forced to illegally source supplies or face paying a fortune for a private prescription. “There’s no need to pay thousands of pounds for private prescriptions any more because so many more people are making medicinal cannabis in the UK. Billy’s care pathway plan is now funded by the NHS – that includes his private doctor for writing the prescription and his medicine. And then the neurology team at Great Ormond Street Hospital in London who have been overseeing everything as well. It’s amazing for us after four years of battling.”
Billy was assessed through a new service called the Refractory Epilepsy Specialist Clinical Advisory Service (RESCAS), which was set up this year by the UK Health Secretary Matt Hancock. It aims to recommend cannabis medicines for children with intractable epilepsy, although Billy is so far the only child to have successfully gone through this framework. Although the setting up of RESCAS has had a very positive reception, new systems do not always mean a change in medical practice, and only time will tell how effective it will be.
Ms Caldwell may have won the battle for her son, but there are still many others in the UK suffering due to their inability to access medical cannabis. She is grateful for the help she's had and wants to provide the same support to others in a similar situation. She stated “today I am also thinking of all the people in the UK and Ireland who are still being denied access to medicinal cannabis and will commit myself to do all I can to promote access and more clinical research to enable more to benefit from the medicine that has saved Billy’s life.” She reiterated her gratitude to those who've been by her side - “to the tens of thousands of people who have followed Billy’s journey over the years I want you to know that your support meant the world to me.”