When he was twelve years old, Christian was diagnosed with sinusitis: the mucous membrane of his sinuses was inflamed and riddled with tumors. The malignant cells grew uncontrollably, spread, and destroyed the tissue. "Cancer," the now 42-year-old summarizes the diagnosis without hesitation. The doctor told him from the beginning that he wouldn't be able to live pain-free with medication alone. "That's why he advised me and my parents to use cannabis."
His parents were initially hesitant, but then procured cannabis for him on the black market. The teenager smoked the buds in a pipe, and sure enough, the pain subsided. When hemp shops sprang up like mushrooms shortly afterward, obtaining cannabis became easier. But the joy was short-lived: In the early 2000s, the shops closed across Switzerland. "A friend started growing his own during that time, and at some point, I started growing hemp myself," Christian recounts. It took him a long time to figure out the best way to consume it for his pain. "I either smoked the hemp in the form of a cannabis-honey oil in a bong, or I held a vaporizer directly under my nose."
Learning and working in pain
School became torture for him. On the one hand, as a teenager, he didn't want to be constantly high, and on the other hand, he faced expulsion for using cannabis. So he only smoked at home. "During class, I could barely stand the pain," Christian recalls. Despite this, he graduated and then began an apprenticeship as an application developer. He successfully completed this as well. But the subsequent jobs in the high-security areas of two companies proved challenging for the then 20-year-old. "With the pain, it was almost impossible to concentrate on work all day." He occasionally smoked a joint in secret, but that wasn't enough. His condition worsened.
In 2009, Christian was admitted to a closed psychiatric ward, where he would remain for 13 years. "The worst time of my life," he sums up. Instead of cannabis, he was given cortisone to combat the tumor growth. "But that didn't alleviate the pain; on the contrary." The neuroleptics he later took also proved ineffective. "So at some point, I started smuggling my own marijuana into the psychiatric ward," he confesses. But it wasn't long before he was caught red-handed. "When they tried to take the marijuana away from me, I went berserk. I screamed that they would hurt me if they did." His resistance had an effect: in 2020, two years before his discharge, he was prescribed cannabis. Completely legally.
Health insurance company backs down
To this day, cannabis remains his most important companion. "When I wake up in the morning, I don't feel any pain, but it only takes a few minutes for the headache to set in." For him, there's no alternative to cannabis. But although medical cannabis flowers have been recognized as a pain reliever since 2022 and his doctor prescribes them, his health insurance company refuses to cover the costs. "They paid at first because they acknowledge that inhaling cannabis flowers alleviates my symptoms." He has this in writing. But a few months ago, KPT stopped the payments. "Their main justification is the supposedly insufficient body of research. But the studies speak for themselves." What he does get approved for, however, even though it's hardly effective in his case, is expensive cannabis tincture to drink. "I'm ordering huge quantities of it now because it's the only thing that's covered," says Christian , shaking his head. "It's completely absurd."
As a private payer, the disability insurance recipient can no longer afford medical cannabis. Therefore, he's resorting to the black market, just like before. "It's awful that I'm forced to obtain cannabis flowers illegally. Especially since the health insurance company knows about the positive effects of the flowers on my pain." Because of this absurdity, bizarre scenes keep unfolding. For example, after a recent household accident, the police arrived instead of an ambulance and promptly confiscated his cannabis supplies. "When I objected that I desperately needed it for my pain, they told me I should just buy more on the black market." Christian has found the situation unbearable. Knowing he can count on MEDCAN's support gives him hope. "I hope this sorry state of affairs will soon come to an end."
