‘Medical cannabis bill has fighting chance in 20th Congress’

MANILA, Philippines — Sen. Robinhood Padilla’s refiling and authorship of the medical cannabis bill, already approved by the House of Representatives, may just be the needed impetus to have the measure enacted into law in the 20th Congress.

Former congressman and now Gov. LRay Villafuerte of Camarines Sur, author of House Bill 10439, expressed optimism that legalizing the use of medical cannabis now stands a chance at becoming a law after it stalled in the Senate plenary last June.

“With Sen. Robin refiling his version of this measure, I have high hopes that the medical cannabis bill has a shot this time around at getting finally ratified by the 20th Congress and then signed into law by President Marcos,” Villafuerte said.

House Bill 10439 was approved on third and final reading in the House in 2024, but its counterpart measure, Senate Bill 2573, which Padilla and a dozen others endorsed, got stuck in the plenary level before the sine die adjournment of the 19th Congress.

The medical cannabis bill is listed as one of Padilla’s 10 priority measures in the 20th Congress, which will convene on July 28.

Medical cannabis will be used as an alternative, relatively more affordable pain reliever for Filipinos hurting from debilitating medical conditions, allowing people suffering from cancer and other severe ailments to use the non-addictive strain of the cannabis or marijuana plant as a legal, relatively more affordable alternative treatment.

Debilitating medical conditions include cancer, multiple sclerosis, damage to the nervous system, glaucoma, positive status for human immunodeficiency virus, acquired immunodeficiency syndrome, post-traumatic stress disorder, rheumatoid arthritis and other ailments identified by the Department of Health.

Medical cannabis can now be used to treat severe ailments such as cancer, epilepsy, HIV or human immunodeficiency virus and post-traumatic stress disorder, among many others, as this is a relatively more affordable alternative to modern medicines.

Villafuerte said he remains optimistic about SB 2573’s chances in the Senate, on the basis that at least 13 senators have already signed Committee Report 210 endorsing the bill for plenary deliberations and approval.

“I am keeping my fingers crossed that senators would also give weight to the fact that medical cannabis has already been legalized in 60 countries, and that its medicinal value has been affirmed in medical journals of various prominent global institutions,” he said.