Pa. enters the medical marijuana era
It likely has taken far too long, but Pennsylvania is finally ready to enter the era of legal marijuana. At least for medicinal purposes. The Pennsylvania Legislature signed off on allowing patients with some specific, medical, pain-related issues access to legal marijuana in April of last year.
Almost a year later, the first medical dispensaries – where those patients can legally obtain a variety of pills, lotions, vapors, tinctures, ointments and creams – will open this week.
In this area, the closest facility, Keystone Shops, is located on Lancaster Avenue in Devon. The doors will open Saturday. A second one will open in Sellersville, Bucks County. They will join four others slated to open this week in Butler, Bethlehem, Pittsburgh and Enola.
A facility in Malvern at the corner of Planebrook Road and Route 30 is expected to open its doors later this month. Eventually two dispensaries will be located in Delaware County, in Upper Darby and Yeadon.
Two other dispensaries, in Phoenixville and Lancaster, last week got the green light to begin operations. Their opening dates have not yet been set. It’s about time. Pennsylvania took a winding, circuitous route to this point, certainly a new era in dealing with marijuana.
First a few ground rules, and one final attempt to clear away the haze of some misinformation of those who simply don’t understand what Pennsylvania is doing, hear the word marijuana, and immediately seize on visions of “Reefer Madness.”
This is not Colorado. Pennsylvania is not legalizing the sale or possession of cannabis. At least not yet, although there are more than a few people who believe that would not necessarily be a bad idea.
The medical marijuana being dispensed at these facilities will go only to those with a special permit given to them by a doctor. For the most part, those with prescriptions for medical marijuana suffer from a variety of ailments, including children who suffer from autism, as well as adults who deal with chronic pain, tremors and other maladies. Like what you might ask? Medical marijuana is approved to ease pain associated with ALS, autism, cancer, Chrohn’s Disease, epilepsy, glaucoma, HIV/ AIDS, Huntington’s Disease, inflammatory bowel disease, intractable spasticity, Multiple Sclerosis, neuropathies, Parkinson’s Disease, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD), Sickle Cell Anemia and severe chronic or intractable pain.
Citizens will not be able to enter these dispensaries and buy marijuana – not medical marijuana or “weed” that could be smoked. First they have to have a prescription. And even then these facilities will not dispense pot that could be rolled, smoked or placed in your bong.
The path to this point involved several stages, including doctors looking to enroll in the program, the state issuing licenses for facilities that will grow the medical marijuana, and finally for dispensaries where it can be placed into the hands of those in need.
So far Pennsylvania has approved 10 dispensaries and 10 grower/processor facilities.
More than 17,000 patients have registered to participate in the state’s medical marijuana program, nearly 4,000 of those certified by a physician. To date 708 physicians have registered to take part in the program, and of those 376 have completed training to become certified practitioners.
Gov. Tom Wolf, in noting the historic nature of the moment, wisely again stressed this is not something the state entered into lightly – or without good reason.
“Medical marijuana is legal, safe and now available to Pennsylvanians suffering from 17 serious medical conditions,” Wolf said. “We have developed a regulatory infrastructure, approved physicians as practitioners, certified patients to participate, and launched a new industry to help thousands find relief from their debilitating illnesses.
The program is expected to be fully operational by the end of the year across the state.
As usual in Pennsylvania, where passing a budget, selling alcohol and drawing Congressional maps tends to get bogged down in politics and partisan bickering, the road to legal use of medical marijuana has been a long one.
But we’ve reached the end of the road.
And for those dealing with chronic, debilitating pain, hopefully the start of a new life.