The Fix Dan's Law petition, which has long called for simpler and more affordable access to medicinal cannabis, has been relaunched with a new appeal directed at the Labor government to back a three-year pilot compassionate access scheme for Australians who cannot obtain the medicine they need.
Since Lucy Haslam started the change.org petition in 2014 — two years before her son Dan died from bowel cancer — it has accumulated nearly 440,000 signatures.
The campaign has become one of the most enduring on the change.org platform.
With the eighth anniversary of Dan's death approaching, Haslam has updated the petition with a new message to supporters.
In her post on the site, Haslam acknowledged that the petition's original goal of legalising medicinal cannabis was achieved, but said "politicians failed us".
"On his deathbed, Dan asked me to keep fighting until all patients that needed access could achieve it, so here I am in 2023, coming up to Dan's 8th death anniversary, still trying to fulfil that promise," she wrote.
"The previous Coalition government regulated medicinal cannabis via the Special Access Scheme which meant that it was tightly controlled, access was restricted and full costs were to be borne by the patient.
"I'm calling on the new Labor government to help us #FixDansLaw by launching a three-year pilot program of the compassionate access scheme, Compass, for patients unable to afford medicinal cannabis for serious conditions."
Compass was launched last May by the Australian Medicinal Cannabis Association (AMCA).
Haslam also described medicinal cannabis as a "medicine for the wealthy", a situation she said a government-backed compassionate access scheme would help to remedy.
In a related development, change.org has emailed all 440,000 petition signatories asking them to contact their MPs and encourage them to join the newly reformed Parliamentary Friends of Medicinal Cannabis Group.
To date, 250 emails have been sent by signatories to their representatives urging involvement in the group.
