University of West Indies calls on Barbados government to enact legislation to afford studies

Image Source: bajanreporter.com 

BRIDGETOWN, Barbados, May 31, CMC – The University of the West Indies (UWI) has called on the Barbados government to enact the necessary legislation to allow its scientists to undertake studies on the medicinal purposes of marijuana.

The Cave Hill campus of the UWI has announced plans for a symposium on marijuana in September and would welcome the required legislation to advance its research on the plant.

“The Cave Hill campus has been investigating the medicinal value of Barbadian plants,” Principal of the campus, Professor Eudine Barriteau, said, adding “however, I must and need to inform the public before our colleagues at Cave Hill can conduct research on marijuana the government of Barbados would need to create an enabling environment by producing the legislative framework to do so”.

Last week, a Barbados government legislator criticised the UWI for its failure to lead the regional efforts on the research of marijuana for medicinal purposes.

“We have this talent at the UWI and we should have been at the forefront of marijuana uses for diseases, for medical purposes. We should have been at the forefront,” Government Senator Jeptor Ince told the Senate during the debate on the Caribbean Accreditation Authority for Education in Medicine and Other Health Professions (Incorporation) Bill, 2016.

Ince, the parliamentary secretary in the Ministry of Finance, told legislators that he was disappointed at the position of the UWI and warned that the Caribbean was at risk of being left behind if the regional educational institution continued to focus on some of the traditional subjects it offered.

He insisted that the UWI had to look at research in medicine as a way to boost its revenues, saying it was also clear that the marijuana industry was exploding, particularly in the United States.

“I am confident the research needs to be done; not only that, but in other areas. So, don’t let us sit back… let us implement with haste these things that are important, Ince said, adding that “education is an investment… We have produced some of the best academics anywhere in the world and I am still bothered that we have a UWI… that is not doing enough research”, he said.

But Barriteau said that the government of \jasmaica ensured that marijuana research was undertaken at the Mona campus by passing the necessary legislation in April 2015.

“So my colleagues and my fellow principal at the Mona campus can legitimately and legally conduct that research,” she added.

Earlier this year, St Vincent and the Grenadines Prime Minister Dr Ralph Gonsalves called for a collective Caribbean approach regarding the trade and other benefits of marijuana cultivation in the region.

“We have to have the studies. That is why I advocated the Caribbean marijuana commission. In the changing global context of marijuana use, Caribbean economists and other relevant professionals, including those in the pharmaceutical industry, ought to be ahead of the curve in conducting relevant research, not rehearsing traversed territory,” Gonsalves said in an address to the launch of 40th anniversary celebrations at the Cave Hill campus of the University of the West Indies.

In 2014, regional leaders, at their summit in Antigua, announced the establishment of the commission as they discussed the means of decriminalising marijuana for medicinal purposes.