Cannabis: Medical Treatments

(asked on 28th January 2021) - View Source

Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what estimate he has made of the number of patients who have received prescriptions for the use of medicinal cannabis to treat their medical conditions.


Answered by
Jo Churchill Portrait
Jo Churchill
Minister of State (Department for Work and Pensions)
This question was answered on 3rd February 2021

For licensed medicinal cannabis products prescribed on the National Health Service and dispensed within a community setting in England, the NHS Business Services Authority can confirm that 413 unique patients have been identified. However, for a significant number of such prescription items the patient could not be uniquely identified This was as a result of these items being prescribed on a hospital form and the low capture rate of patient level information from hospital forms dispensed in the community.

For unlicensed cannabis-based products dispensed in the community in England, the NHS Business Services Authority is unable to provide the number of NHS patients. This information is being withheld in accordance with the General Data Protection Regulation, due to there being less than five patients and the very high risk of the potential of patients being identified.

No estimate has been made of the overall number of patients that have received licensed or unlicensed cannabis-based medicines. Private prescriptions submitted to the NHS Business Services Authority do not hold information where it can categorically be determined if the patient is unique.

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