On October 19, 2018, we as a country celebrated the first-ever National Psoriatic Arthritis day. In keeping the momentum going we would like to highlight one of Medicinal My Way’s esteemed ambassadors, the President of the Canadian Spondylitis Association, Gerald Major.
Gerald Major is a medical cannabis patient, a staunch chronic illness advocate and an arthritis survivor. Gerald’s Arthritis took him out of full-time employment 8 years ago when he was the Senior Vice President of Operations for Citibank Hedge Fund Services North America. Since then, he’s become the President of the Canadian Spondylitis Association, Vice President of Canadians for Fair Access to Medicinal Marijuana, board member and consumer group chair of the Arthritis Alliance of Canada, Best Medicine Coalition board member, and a member of Ontario Best Practice Research Initiative patient advisory committee.
His passion for advocacy stems from his personal battle with Ankylosing Spondylitis and Psoriatic Arthritis, both inflammatory arthritis that ends in fusion in the back and peripheral joints. Gerald is frequently invited to share his story of Spondyloarthritis, Mental Health and Medical Cannabis by the healthcare community. In 2016, upon noticing the barriers to medical cannabis access for patients, Gerald joined CFAMM and shared his story of eliminating sleeping pills and significantly reducing his opioid prescriptions by way of medical cannabis. Gerald was an athlete growing up playing Hockey, Track and Field and most anything that required athletics. His arthritis condition started at 14 years of age and it took his ability to participate in sport from him. He now works to get all of that back by way of Medical Cannabis.
“I’ve had a very difficult journey and I feel giving back to others by advocating, educating and supporting will make things much better for everyone. I worry about those people who can’t afford to make a safer choice and I worry about our current opioid crisis and the people dying daily. I will not stop advocating until we have Universal Pharmacare inclusive of Medical Cannabis and no Canadian is left behind. We can do better together.” – Gerald Major.
To learn about Medicinal My Way’s esteemed Ambassadors visit www.medicinalmyway.ca/ambassadors
