Ministry of Health removes the incorporation of cannabidiol in SUS from Conitec's agenda
According to the commission, the reason for withdrawal is that the Ministry has not concluded the study it has been conducting on the subject
Charles Vilela
The Ministry of Health has removed from the agenda of the next Conitec meeting (National Commission for the Incorporation of Technologies in SUS), which will take place next week, on the 8th and 9th, the request for the incorporation of cannabidiol (CBD) into the Unified Health System (SUS).
Until yesterday (3), the topic "cannabidiol 200mg/ml for the treatment of refractory epilepsies in children and adolescents to conventional treatments", proposed by the ministry, was listed on the commission's website. According to Conitec, the reason for the withdrawal is that the Ministry has not concluded the study it has been conducting on the subject.
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With the removal of the topic from the December Conitec meeting agenda, the matter will only be discussed again starting in February, when the commission resumes its regular meetings. The schedule of meetings for 2021 will be defined at the meeting next week.
On the 1st, Sechat revealed that the Brazilian Association of Pharmaceutical Inputs Industry (Abiquifi) - an entity with 44 member companies, eight of which are directly involved in the medicinal cannabis theme - had sent a letter to the Ministry of Health requesting that the inclusion of cannabidiol in SUS not be linked to a specific concentration of the product, but only to its active ingredient.
The purpose of the document delivered on Monday (30) by Abiquifi to the Secretariat of Science, Technology, and Strategic Inputs of the agency is to ensure that the incorporation of cannabidiol in SUS is done broadly and not only in relation to a specific concentration.
According to the entity, if only the incorporation of cannabidiol at a concentration of 200mg/ml is approved, only one product available on the market can be purchased by SUS, from the Prati-Donaduzzi brand. "We believe that the inclusion (of cannabidiol in SUS) should be made without being linked to a specific concentration: it should be cannabidiol, not necessarily cannabidiol 200 mg/ml," argues the coordinator of the entity's Cannabis Inputs working group, Carolina Sellani. "In this way, other products, with different concentrations, could also be incorporated into SUS. It would be a way to make it (the incorporation) broader."
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