Medical marijuana law: How it will work

TALLAHASSEE — The medical marijuana law approved by the Legislature on Friday sets up the regulations for the constitutional amendment approved by 71 percent of the voters in November.

Here’s how the law, which Gov. Rick Scott has said he will sign, affects patients, doctors, caregivers and growers.

For patients

The bill bans smoking marijuana for medicinal purposes, but it does allow vaping and eating.

The smoking ban is almost certain to result in legal action because the constitutional amendment voters approved in November bans smoking in public. Advocates of the amendment, led by Orlando trial attorney John Morgan, say this is an implicit legalization of smoking in private. Morgan has vowed to file a lawsuit over the issue.

Patients will be able to obtain a marijuana recommendation for a 70-day supply, with two refills before having to go back to a doctor.

To qualify for medical marijuana, patients must have cancer, epilepsy, glaucoma, HIV/AIDS, PTSD, ALS, Crohn’s disease, Parkinson’s disease, multiple sclerosis or a condition of the “same kind or class,” though what precisely that means is uncertain. Patients also qualify if they have chronic pain related to one of the named diseases or are terminally ill.

Patients can receive a medical marijuana recommendation from a doctor right away — a 90-day waiting period that was in the 2014 law no longer applies. Purchases of medical marijuana will be sales-tax free.

For doctors

Before recommending marijuana to patients, doctors have to complete a twohour course administered by the Florida Medical Association or the Florida Osteopathic Medical Association. That course can cost up to $500.

Doctors who want to recommend marijuana for patients cannot have a financial interest in a grower or testing lab.

To recommend marijuana, doctors have to diagnose a patient with one of the qualifying conditions. That examination must be done in person.

Two doctors must recommend medical marijuana for minors to receive it, and the bill bans pregnant women from getting any marijuana except low-THC noneuphoric varieties.

Doctors are responsible for checking the state medical marijuana registry to make sure their patient is on it and for adding to it the fact that their patient has now been given an order for marijuana.

For caregivers

Because many of the patients who qualify for medical marijuana are too sick to travel to dispensaries or, in some cases, need help administering marijuana, the constitutional amendment that voters approved permits caregivers to pick up the marijuana and give it to a patient.

The bill requires caregivers to be Florida residents 21 or older who are not doctors.

They have to pass a background check and complete a training course that can cost up to $100.

For growers

The 2014 medical marijuana law allowed seven licensed medical marijuana growers to operate throughout the state. Those growers are responsible for all cultivation, processing, transportation and sale of marijuana.

The bill will add 10 new growers licenses, five by July and another five by October. The rapid turnaround of the first five is possible only because they have already applied and came in just behind the seven current growers in the application process with the Department of Health. The next five will include at least one African-American grower and four others.

All of them will have to go through the application process with the Health Department.

Of the four licenses other than the black farmer’s one, the Health Department can give preferential treatment for up to two of them to citrus canning and concentrating operations.

For every 100,000 patients added to the registry, four more licenses will be issued.

Each license holder has to grow, process, transport and sell the marijuana and can open no more than 25 dispensaries across the state.