Medical marijuana patients in Maryland will soon be able to finally actually access medical marijuana as the state approved medical cannabis rules Thursday.
But it has taken the state forever – and left patients languishing – to get this far. And patients will still have to wait until 2016 to access any buds.
Sitting cross-legged on the floor in her apartment outside of Houston, Faith’s mother looks over at the toddler repeatedly as she talks. There are no physical indicators that signal the start of a seizure, but Faith’s mother can tell one is on its way. Everything about raising Faith involves watching and waiting, and today is no different.
Suddenly, Faith’s mom jumps up, her words stalling mid-sentence, and makes her way to the mat where the chocolate-haired child is lying. She plops down next to her daughter, gives her moon face and chubby-cherub limbs a once-over, and places a hand across her tiny chest, feeling for any sign of what’s to come. It’s an unnerving ritual, the watching and waiting, but Faith’s mom can feel what is happening in her own bones. She knows that Faith is about to seize.
The Houston Press took a look at medical marijuana refugees from Texas, and it’s a compelling read.
Earlier this week, a reader passed along the following note and video to us. It’s a frustrating tale that unfortunately is all too common, even in states that allow for medical cannabis use and cultivation.
“Deborah and Dennis are elderly patients living in San Diego that decided to grow a small amount of cannabis for personal use and soon after were raided by the San Diego Narcotics Task Force. Deborah Little has been HIV positive for over 20 years and her husband suffers from nerve damage – there is no reason they should have been raided and dragged through the judicial system. Thankfully, they were both found NOT GUILTY in the end, but not before the public officials made their life a living hell for nearly 2 years. It is a true injustice that patients are still having to deal with this in 2014.”
Medical-marijuana patients are still at risk for a DUI conviction simply for having trace amounts of THC in their bloodstreams, the state Court of Appeals confirmed on Tuesday.
In a 3-0 ruling with disclaimers by one judge, the court upheld the conviction of a Mesa man despite an apparent exception for such prosecutions in the voter-approved, 2010 medical-pot law.
Arizona, if you haven’t heard, has a zero-tolerance law against drivers with marijuana metabolites in their veins, medical card or not. Our May 2013 feature article, “Riding High,” covered how it was possible for patients or illegal cannabis users to be convicted for DUI even when impairment wasn’t a factor, and even when the only metabolite found was carboxy-THC, a molecule known to be inactive.
Medical marijuana patient numbers dipped to their second lowest total since recreational cannabis sales began in January. As of the end of July, there were 111,804 medical marijuana patients on the Colorado Medical Marijuana Registry according to Colorado Department of Public Health and Environment statistics — just 825 patients more than were on the list January 1 — even though more than 20,000 new-patient applications were submitted over that span.
Berkeley California is arguably one of the most progressive cities in the country. With that in mind, it’s not shocking at all that the city now requires medical marijuana dispensaries to donate up to two percent of their products to low-income patients in the city. The plan goes into effect in August 2015.
Of course, mainstream media like Fox News have picked up on this and are running with it, implying that the city is just handing out weed.
| Rand Paul. |
Kentucky Sen. Rand Paul this week stood up for state medical marijuana rights, filing an amendment to Sen. John Walsh’s jobs bill that would allow the 33 states with some form of legalized medical cannabis to “enact and implement laws that authorize the use, distribution, possession, or cultivation of marijuana for medical use” without the feds intervening.
New statistics by the Arizona Department of Health Services show that Arizona now has more than 50,000 qualifying, adult patients.
As of June 30, the state had 52,638 “active cardholders,” which is a 9.1 percent increase from the last official number published by the agency on March 28 of 48,231 patients. The recently released quarterly report also shows 93 minor patients and another 94 minors being treated by caregivers, which is a 34 percent increase over those same categories in the March 28 report. That increase could be due to a judge’s ruling in late March that allows the use of concentrated marijuana, which can be used in pills or food items for youngsters with epilepsy or other serious ailments.
More over at the Phoenix New Times.
Arizona’s medical-marijuana law is so vague, the state can’t prosecute patients who sell pot to other patients, a Pima County Superior Court judge has ruled.
The offbeat, July 2 ruling and dismissal of a criminal case by Judge Richard Fields has the potential to open up all sorts of entrepreneurial opportunities for Arizonans to sell marijuana legally.
If it survives an appeal, that is.
Last month, pot activists cheered as the U.S. House approved an amendment to a spending bill that will end funding for U.S. Justice Department and Drug Enforcement Administration raids on medical marijuana operations and patients otherwise following their state law.
Now a companion amendment in the U.S. Senate has found traction with Republican Sen. Rand Paul of Kentucky and Democrat Sen. Cory Booker of New Jersey. A second senate amendment sponsored by Sen. John Walsh, a Democrat from Montana, would protect patients in medical cannabis states from prosecution for firearms possession and use.