Medical cannabis fundraisers take on 550km journey from London to Holland

Teams from across the sector will travel the equivalent distance of the significant journey to mark Medical Cannabis Awareness Week.

This Medical Cannabis Awareness Week (1-8 November) leading organisations are teaming up to walk, run and swim the length of the journey from London to Holland.

Their efforts are a bid to continue to boost awareness of medical cannabis and raise much-needed funds for the Sapphire Medical Foundation, which aims to reduce the financial barriers to access faced by patients.

Prior to the change in the law on 1 November 2018, the only way to access life-changing medicine for some patients was via the long journey to Holland.

Many patients criminalised themselves bringing the medicine back to the UK to treat their own health conditions or those of their severely ill children.

But even since the rescheduling, only a handful of prescriptions have been issued on the NHS and although access is improving, many patients struggle to afford the private healthcare fees.

The Sapphire Medical Foundation was founded in 2019 to offer financial aid to the individuals who are unable to afford the costs associated with medical cannabis prescriptions.

The first person to receive a grant from the foundation in July this year, was former teacher Kirran Gill, who had to give up her career as a result of her fibromyalgia.

However, coronavirus restrictions have made fundraising extremely challenging across the entire voluntary sector.

The team at Sapphire Medical Foundation are asking people to help ease some of the pressure by walking, running or swimming the 550km distance, with all funds raised going directly to help patients in need with the cost of medical cannabis prescriptions.

Dr Simon Erridge, Trustee and Co-founder of Sapphire Medical Foundation and Academic Clinician at Imperial College London said: “At Sapphire Medical Foundation we are committed to helping patients afford medical cannabis prescriptions. In 2020 individuals are facing uncertain futures and there will likely be more people that would benefit from our help.

“Unfortunately this uncertainty has affected fundraising across the charitable sector as a whole, including ourselves, so I would urge anyone who is able to donate to do so via the Sapphire Medical Foundation Website.”

Teams already signed up to take on the distance include: Cellen, CPASS, Canex, Conservative Drug Policy Reform Group, CBMP Access, Centre for Medicinal Cannabis, Hill Dickinson

PLEA (Patient-Led Engagement and Advocacy), Rokshaw, Sapphire Medical Clinics and Women in Medical Cannabis.

To donate visit www.sapphirefoundation.co.uk/donations/mcaw2020 and www.justgiving.com/crowdfunding/sapphirefoundation