Reopening its cannabis regulatory platform after months of disruption caused by the coronavirus, the Food and Drug Administration has prepared a draft bill to abolish a 5-year ban on the private sector making cannabis medicine. Two draft ministerial regulations, one on marijuana and the other on hemp, under scrutiny since the end of last year […]
marijuana
Pandemic upends pot legalization
Ballot campaigns and cannabis bills get pushed aside during public health crisis. What was supposed to be a banner year for marijuana legalization is becoming a bust. Advocates are pushing ballot referendums in nearly a dozen states, from Idaho to New Jersey. Governors and state lawmakers who failed to pass legalization last year — most […]
Support for the STATES Act Yields Unlikely Coalitions
One consequence of the recent groundswell of state marijuana legislation has been the emergence of less charged political discourse surrounding marijuana policy, a topic that was until recently considered a third rail. As the stigma continues to erode at the state level, policymakers are forced to confront more nuanced questions regarding how to regulate marijuana […]
Cannabis finds its moment amid coronavirus outbreak
States across the country now consider pot shops “essential” services and anxious Americans are flocking to them. Cannabis is turning out to be the one thing the coronavirus can’t destroy. Marijuana sales are booming, with some states seeing 20 percent spikes in sales as anxious Americans prepare to be hunkered down in their homes potentially […]
6 questions about traveling with marijuana, answered
America’s relationship with pot is changing. While the substance is illegal to use or possess on a national level under the Controlled Substances Act, some of the country’s states, territories and the District of Columbia have been passing laws to the contrary, and in very different ways, since 1996. At the publishing of this story, […]
Yes, marijuana has a gateway effect. But so do most addictive substances.
When former vice president Joe Biden asserted over the weekend that marijuana shouldn’t be legal because it might be a “gateway” to hard drug use, pro-legalization critics were quick to paint him as an out-of-touch codger still fighting the last drug war. But the reaction isn’t entirely fair: Yes, the marijuana gateway theory that was […]
The new weed on the block: hemp
In 2014, Kentucky farmer Brian Furnish was looking for ways to diversify his crops. His family had been growing tobacco for eight generations, but the market was withering. If he wanted to keep his farm profitable, he needed something new to grow. So he helped pioneer Kentucky’s hemp industry, a new crop the state was […]
Impaired by Marijuana or Not Impaired … That Is The Question
A new reality is taking over. Medical marijuana is now legal in 33 states and the District of Columbia, and recreational marijuana is legal in 11 states and the District of Columbia. The marijuana wave is here to stay. For employers operating in any of these states, the chances are high that at least some […]
Marijuana makes you paranoid? Study suggests your genes are to blame
Weed makes me paranoid. I ate an edible once and became super panicky and I never want to use cannabis again. Marijuana’s supposed to calm you down, but it always makes me feel the opposite. You’ve probably heard such remarks — or said them yourself — in recent years as cannabis inches closer to becoming […]
How the Surgeon General’s Weed Warning Could Hurt Pregnant Women and Mothers
Telling expecting mothers not to use marijuana could have some unexpected consequences Pregnancy is a difficult time. Your body becomes covered in stretch marks and splotches, your calves double in size overnight, and you can’t sit through so much as a PowerPoint presentation without getting up to pee at least thrice. (And don’t get me […]
