Health

It’s about time. After decades of legal chaos, California’s medical marijuana system is now subject to real, enforceable state regulations. Gov. Jerry Brown signed three bills in early October that impose new rules on the famously lawless MMJ industry. It marks the first time since medical weed was legalized in 1996 that the state has had the power to truly ...

Lawmakers say they have reached a deal with California Gov. Jerry Brown that would bring some order to the state’s chaotic medical marijuana system. New cannabis regulations were set to pass the state Legislature in September, and Brown, a Democrat, was expected to sign the law. It would create a new set of statewide regulations for the medical cannabis industry, ...

For all intents and purposes, medical marijuana is now legal, not only under California law but under federal law as well. This means federal agencies and prosecutors will no longer stand in the way of legal medical weed. The change marks the biggest win yet at the federal level and an indication marijuana prohibition may have reached its closing days. ...

Sick children who need medical marijuana to survive are going without because of a series of police raids up and down the Pacific Coast in California. In mid October a local task force of drug warriors raided a dispensary in the San Diego area and destroyed farms in Modesto and Mendocino County in Northern California. The operations were all providing ...

Medical marijuana has quickly become one of the most popular drugs in the United States. As it turns out, there’s a good reason for this: The vast majority of patients – almost all of them – say the drug works. A new California health survey found 92 percent of MMJ patients believe the medicine works on some of their conditions, ...

Opponents of medical weed in California often point to the recommendation system as proof MMJ is a scam. Doctor recommendations are too easy to get, they say, and physicians hand them out like candy in return for a hefty profit. Problem is, the state agency that oversees the medical profession says there’s no evidence to support that view. Pot recommendations ...

Efforts to regulate medical marijuana in California could be headed for trouble – yet again. With just 30 days left to reach a deal that would ensure the new rules pass in the legislature, lawmakers are still floundering, and there are few signs they know exactly what they want the law to do. The proposal to reform the state’s scant ...

Proposed changes to a medical marijuana bill in the California Legislature would take MMJ out of the hands of a state agency and give locals even more power to interfere. State Sen. Lou Correa, a Democrat from Santa Ana, is pushing legislation to regulate California’s medical weed industry for the first time since voters legalized it in 1996. His bill ...

Efforts to legalize weed in California fizzled this year, but the cannabis world is already regrouping for 2016. Which is to say, most of the community is regrouping. Surprising as it may seem, not everyone who supports access to marijuana thinks the drug should be legalized for recreational use. In fact, quite a lot of medical pot patients think the ...

With legalization efforts on hold, Californians will have to wait until 2016 to decide whether they want to regulate marijuana and make it available to all adults over 21. That leaves many in the cannabis community wondering what happens in the meantime. California’s medical marijuana system is in near-chaos, under siege by local governments and federal law enforcement, and the ...