Billy Caldwell Granted License to Use Medical Cannabis at Home
Billy Caldwell, the 12-year-old boy whose epilepsy sparked a national conversation about the U.K.’s drug policy, has been granted an emergency license to be legally treated at home with medical cannabis.
After outrage over the confiscation of Billy’s medicine by customs agents at a Heathrow airport and with Billy’s health rapidly deteriorating, the family was granted an emergency license so Billy could continue to be treated at the family’s home in Castlederg in Northern Ireland.
“The Department of Health yesterday received an emergency licence application from Belfast Trust clinicians regarding medicinal cannabis use for Billy Caldwell,” a department spokesperson said.
Before beginning a cannabis oil treatment in 2016, Billy suffered up to 100 seizures a day. With the help of medical cannabis Billy was able to go 300 days without a seizure.
A doctor in Northern Ireland prescribed Billy cannabis oil last year, but the Home Office recently ordered him to stop doing so. This prompted his mother, Charlotte Caldwell, to take him to Canada to get the medicine, which was then confiscated by border guards upon return to Britain.
The confiscation led to Members of Parliament criticizing cannabis laws in the United Kingdom and to call for urgent reform. An all-party parliamentary group restated a recent pledge to make policy recommendations to help remedy the situation.
“Billy Caldwell is one child out of many hundreds, as well as many thousands of adults, who would benefit from cannabis derived medicines in the U.K.,” said Crispin Blunt, former prisons minister and current co-chair of the all-parliamentary group on drug policy reform.
Last week, the U.K. government announced it would reach a decision within the next few weeks on whether U.K. laws around medical cannabis would be changed. The Advisory Council on the Misuse of Drugs will assess the “balance of harms and public health needs” in terms of rescheduling.
