Hollywood, U.S.A. — Medbox, commented on the fact that Canada’s conservative government will soon stop producing and distributing medical marijuana, leaving it up to the private sector to find ways to distribute the drug in a controlled manner.

Canada’s Health Minister Leona Aglukkaq made the announcement on Sunday, claiming current regulations “have left the system open to abuse.”

Aglukkaq said Canada would no longer produce and distribute marijuana for medical purposes. Instead, companies will be licensed to grow and sell the product at market rates. Thus, Patients with a prescription from a doctor starting in March 2013 will be allowed to purchase a variety of strains of marijuana from licensed producers, who will set prices. Also individuals will no longer be permitted to grow marijuana in their homes for their own personal use, said Aglukkaq.

As a result of the forgoing news, Medbox will be stepping up its efforts in Canada and will be opening up an office in Vancouver British Columbia to assist the private sector in: Non-profit entity formation, assistance in zoning approvals and locating spaces for retail and cultivation, and technology sales to assist with inventory control and overall management of dispensing locations.  The new office will supplement the company’s existing presence in Toronto.

“We are witnessing governments around the world that see the medical benefits of cannabis and are seeking ways to regulate production and distribution of the drug,” said Vincent Mehdizadeh, Founder of Medicine Dispensing Systems, a Subsidiary of Medbox, Inc. “The company stands ready, willing, and able to assist the private sector in all aspects of responsible medicine dispensing that it also legally beyond reproach.”

In other news, the company signed a distribution agreement with MedTrend to place a minimum of 15 Medbox systems in the State of Michigan over the course of the next 36 months. The deal, signed last Friday, allows for Medbox to place these systems with the help of MedTrend and guarantees a $500,000 contract fee to be paid to Medbox by Medtrend that is earned upon execution of the agreement. This fee is a guaranteed minimum and is over and above any additional machine placements, consulting, and maintenance fees Medbox will generate from both initial and future placements in the state of Michigan. MedTrend has company affiliates with ties to over 40 tobacco retail locations within the state, so according to Medbox the deal was easy to digest by all parties.

“We are pleased to have established this distribution relationship in Michigan as it allows the company to grow at a faster rate and with a partner that has roots in the traditional retail industry in the state,” stated Dr. Bruce Bedrick, CEO of Medbox.

Image Courtesy : ChameleonsEye / Shutterstock.com

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On April 16, 2012, New Jersey issued its first permit to grow medical marijuana legally to Greenleaf Compassion Center in Montclair. This is their first step toward enacting medical marijuana distribution centers.

Greenleaf can begin to grow their first crop, which can take around three to four months, but they still face another obstacle before the full plan can be put underway.  The center needs another permit before it may begin distributing to patients.

New Jersey is one of 16 states, plus the District of Columbia, that has laws involving medical marijuana. An additional 12 states have pending legislation to legalize marijuana.  In New Jersey, marijuana is approved for a number of chronic conditions, including seizure disorders, severe pain, cancer, and inflammatory bowel disease. Other states identify similar diseases, but vary in their laws for growing and distribution.

The New Jersey law, New Jersey Compassionate Use Medical Marijuana Act, was signed two years ago by Governor Jon Corzine, but the law has yet to move forward.  Greenleaf Compassion Center, with its CEO Joe Stevens, wrote a letter one month ago to the governor accusing him of purposefully delaying distribution unnecessarily.

According to the Star Ledger, Stevens had a verbal promise from John O’Brien, Jr., head of the legalization program, to begin growing under a preliminary permit.  The promise was later retracted and, to Stevens’ frustration, halted the implement of distribution centers once more.

Following this, a local doctor and his patient, who have been waiting for the centers to become active, sued the state for causing undue suffering to patients by purposefully dragging its feet to delay the program. Despite skepticism, Governor Chris Christie asserts that he is not against the law. However, the first permit was issued only a week after these events took place with no ‘preliminary permit’ needed.

As of now, the problem lies in individual governments that delay the placement of a distribution center in their town. According to NJ.com, Christie said, ‘If individual municipalities do not want an alternative treatment center in their town, I cannot force them to take one.”

There is also some miscommunication between the distribution centers and the government. According to spokesperson of the New Jersey health department, Donna Leusner, in an article on NJ.com, officials are trying to find a balance between ‘public safety and access for qualified patients.’

Some opponents, such as the state Fraternal Order of Police, believe that the care centers will send the wrong message to youths and become central crime hubs.  Supporters are happy to finally see legal rights for natural pain treatment, and many patients eagerly await the substance that could take their pain away.

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A new Michigan-based medical marijuana coalition —The National Patients Rights Association  (NPRA) — has been formed by some of the nation’s leading medical marijuana advocates to protect patient rights.

The group will encourage legislators, prosecutors, and local governments to fully honor the decision of voters that enacted laws to legalize medical marijuana in 16 states and the nation’s capital.  Michigan, whose Michigan Medical Marijuana Act (MMMA) passed by nearly two-thirds of voters (63 percent) in 2008, will be among the first states targeted through the NPRA’s efforts.

The NPRA is backed by patients, caregivers, businesses, and a range of other supporters.  Collectively, the coalition will work to broaden awareness, reach legislators in a targeted manner, and help mobilize patients and caregivers who are affected by these laws.  A key objective of the coalition is a push for definitive regulation in terms of standardization — ranging from safety and storage needs, document management requirements, privacy, and overall industry standards and procedures.

According to the NPRA, Michigan Attorney General Bill Schuette should not circumvent or undermine state laws for the sake of personal beliefs and should honor the will of Michigan voters by helping make implementation of the medicinal marijuana law clearer for all involved parties.  The NPRA believes the Michigan attorney general is:

• Consuming vital public resources by turning medical issues into criminal ones — all the way through our criminal justice system, from police officer to investigator to prosecutor’s offices to our court system
• Politicizing what are societal discussions and decisions regarding how we conduct and administer health care in our society
• Forcing ordinary citizens, many of whom suffer agonizing chronic or constant pain and other serious diseases and disabilities clearly defined by the Michigan Medical Marijuana Act, to turn to unsafe and unsavory sources for marijuana
• Encouraging the current climate of enforcement in many individual jurisdictions, which has had a silencing or inhibiting impact on ethical Michigan medical practitioners (and their medical insurers)
• Leading to patients being prescribed much more dangerous (in terms of addiction and side effects), more expensive and less effective therapeutic agents

Legitimate business activity

The NPRA points out that the Michigan Medical Marijuana Act approved in 2008 by Michigan voters has helped to diversify the state’s economy and subsequently created a new class of entrepreneurs to serve it — many of these business owners understand that participating in the state economy means paying their fair share of taxes.

The NPRA believes that Michigan should consider taxation similar to Colorado.  In that state, medical marijuana dispensaries pay sales tax on all transactions, including other retail products they sell.  The dispensaries also must apply for a license to operate and pay application fees. These fees fund Colorado’s medical marijuana enforcement division, which regulates the industry.

“The reality is that not all patients and their caregivers have the interest, resources or skills to carefully grow therapeutic-grade medical marijuana. These patients need safe access to medical marijuana that meets the therapeutic objectives of their licensed health care practitioners,” said Paul Tylenda, a Grosse Pointe attorney.  “The Colorado model combines maximal benefit for patients, tax revenue generation and appropriate regulation of the program.”

Northern Lights Hydroponic & Garden Supply in Madison Heights, Mich., — offering a complete line of hydroponic, indoor and outdoor gardening supplies — is one example of a local business that has significantly grown its customer base as a direct result of the Michigan Medical Marijuana Act.

Having served the area for more than 16 years as Jim’s Flowers, the company recently expanded its operations by taking over an 8,000-square-foot retail space that had been sitting vacant for more than four years.

“Medical marijuana has been beneficial to my horticulture business, because it has allowed me to add income year round,” said Joe Alfery, co-owner of Northern Lights.  “I also take pride in the fact that since our business has expanded into a once-empty building, we have helped play a role in both the beautification of our community as well as become a larger tax contributor to our state.”

Image Courtesy of   http://www.flickr.com/photos/michigancommunities/

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James Shaw, director of the Union of Medical Marijuana Patients, announced that the Union has provided the members of the Los Angeles City Council and City Attorney two motions to regulate medical cannabis dispensaries as an alternative to the City Attorney draconian solution to the city council’s concerns (the initial drafts are posted at www.Unionmmp.org).

“We have had extensive meetings with the council staff over the past two months and heard their concerns about neighborhood complaints about some dispensaries,” said Shaw. “At the same time, we argued that a total ban on patient associations and their dispensaries would have a significant downside.”

There are an estimated quarter million medical marijuana patients in the city using this for problems as varied as cancer and AIDS pain, multiple sclerosis, insomnia, and depression. A University of California Santa Cruz study found that 80 percent of medical cannabis users preferred this to the ineffectiveness and side effects of prescription drugs for the same ailments.

There is no data on how many patients are also recreational users, but since marijuana is inexpensive and widely available on the black market in Los Angeles, it seems unlikely that a large percentage of patients are purely recreational users, despite the assertions of critics of medical marijuana.

“What this means is that if the city bans dispensaries that all these patients will be forced to take the six plants they are legally entitled to grow to their homes, creating mini-marijuana farms, and their associated dispensaries in every neighborhood in the city, each of which will potentially attract robberies,” said Shaw. “This would be a disaster after all the progress made in recent years in reducing violent crime.”

Many patients will find the attempt to grow marijuana very frustrating and expensive, since it is a complicated process in the dry climate of Southern California, requiring a great deal of water and electricity, he pointed out. The result: many patients will be forced back to the black market.

The city attorney has not addressed the fact that closing 350 dispensaries and dispersing the plants will have an undetermined impact on the environment. “In October, we filed a lawsuit because the original medical cannabis ordinance did not come with a study required by the California Environmental Quality Act assessing its impact on things like traffic, water usage, and pollution concentrated in neighborhoods where the 70-100 mega-dispensaries would be as envisioned by the ordinance,” said Shaw.

“The city attorney never provided a serious answer, and the lawsuit is ongoing. He now proposes to deal with this and the more than 60 lawsuits about other aspects of his fatally-flawed ordinance by banning dispensaries entirely. But in his proposal for the ban, he fails to recognize that dispersing up to 1.5 million plants and associated dispensaries into every neighborhood creates an environmental impact that needs to be assessed.”

The Union has proposed two motions for the city council to consider. The first, “public nuisance abatement,” proposes that city officials start enforcing current laws to deal with complaints like loitering and sales to minors, just as the police handle such problems around liquor stores.

There has been little effort to do this, Shaw said, which is why neighbors of dispensaries sometimes complain. The city would then wait until the state Supreme Court rules on the constitutionality of a ban and on the extent to which it can regulate without being accused of “authorizing” a substance that is on the U.S. government’s Schedule I of Controlled Substances (cocaine is on the less serious Schedule II). This would avoid further expensive litigation.

The second motion calls for a “ban with abeyance”, or a soft ban, which would create a ban that allows patient associations to prove that they are operating in compliance with local and state law, allowing the ban to be held in abeyance as long as they continue to be in compliance. This would provide due process and have none of the negatives of the proposed total ban, while giving patients safe access to their medicine.

“Our attorneys have determined that this would be a way of having strict regulation without issuing permits, which are considered ‘authorization and forbidden by federal preemption,’ if the so-called Pack decision is upheld by the state Supreme Court,” said Shaw.

“We have provided the Council with the rewording for the ordinance to be able to implement this, and we have recommended third party verification an option that would provide law enforcement the information it needs, while protecting patient privacy and Fifth Amendment rights, neither of which is addressed in the original ordinance.”

The Union welcomes debate on these and other motions and believes a rush to a total ban would be a disaster for the city, the police, neighborhoods, patient associations, and medical cannabis patients.

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