Delta 8 and delta 10: Are they legal?
Effects of the two are not well studied; 1 is in murky territory
The University District’s Releaf Center advertises cannabinoids in bright colored letters festooned on shop windows facing North High Street.
Despite a bright green facade and product lists that evoke marijuana, most of the store’s offerings are innocuous. The shelves are lined with cannabidiol, a non-intoxicating cannabis extract sold as a nutritional supplement and known by the initials CBD, along with glass pipes, hookahs, and statues depicting fantasy characters.
But another cannabis-derived compound available at Releaf, THC delta 8, is in murky legal territory.
The effects of delta 8 and its cousin THC delta 10 are not well studied, and the products fall into a gray area in state and federal law. But the medical and statutory uncertainty does not stop stores across Ohio from offering them.
Releaf Center’s owner at first expressed interest in commenting for this story, but eventually stopped answering messages from a Dispatch reporter.
Other business owners insisted their delta 8 and
delta 10 are both safe and legal.
Brendon Lisk, who owns Premium Delta 8 Instant Delivery in Colorado, said that all of his company’s products come from hemp flower and contain less than .3% THC, making it legal under the 2018 Farm Bill, which permitted hemp cultivation and sale and set the threshold differentiating the crop from marijuana (hemp and marijuana both come from cannabis).
All of the company’s products – which are available in Ohio – come from licensed wholesalers, Lisk said in an email.
But it’s easy to get confused about the compounds. Cannabinoids are governed by a patchwork of sometimes conflicting state and federal laws.
Is it legal?
Ohio law specifically outlaws THC delta-9, marijuana’s most intoxicating ingredient. But when state lawmakers approved medical marijuana in 2014, it empowered the Ohio Department of Commerce to decide which cannabis-based products should be relegated to medical marijuana dispensaries.
The commerce department, for example, limited CBD to dispensary sales until a 2019 state law legal
ized hemp and all of its derivatives.
State agencies say they are waiting on federal guidance regarding delta 8 and delta 10.
Their uncertainty stems from a federal law barring any synthetic compound mimicking an illegal drug. Delta 8 and delta 10 can be synthesized in a lab, said Doug Berman, director of the Drug Enforcement and Policy Center at Ohio State University.
Following the advent of CBD, producers found ways to extract additional compounds from the cannabis extract, said David Radford, a doctor and the chief operating officer of Three Day Botanicals, a hemp retailer in the Cleveland suburbs.
“By tweaking the molecule, they could create delta 8 and delta 10,” he said.
If synthetic delta 8 and delta 10 are designed to mimic marijuana, the compounds are illegal.
“The argument is ‘the hemp plant is legal, and all we are doing is manufacturing a clever new product from the hemp plant,’” Berman said.
Business owners interviewed for this article insist their delta 8 and delta 10 are natural.
Does that mean stores like the Releaf Center can continue to sell the compounds as long as they are not synthetic? Maybe.
A representative of the Ohio Department of Agriculture, which regulates food and supplement sales, said the agency awaits a DEA ruling.
“Until that time, we continue to urge all processors and consumers to thoroughly review all relevant state and federal laws before making and/or consuming these products,” Shelby Croft, the department’s communications director, said in an email.
In the meantime, regulators have not told any stores to stop selling it, Croft said
Is it safe?
No one is entirely certain if the compounds are intoxicating or safe to use.
“There are no long term studies and nobody is doing decent analytical testing,” said Radford, who doesn’t sell either compound because he is unconvinced that they are safe.
Sellers said that some customers treat the product just like CBD.
“Delta 8 gummies are our top selling products as they help tremendously with sleep and anxiety,” Lisk said.
Cannabidiol is believed to have a calming effect, but its benefits are not well understood. Some studies show it reduces anxiety, others found it no better than a placebo. Unscrupulous CBD merchants have muddied the picture with unsupported and scientifically dubious claims about the extract’s medical benefits.
Tim Alley, who owns the Peace Pipes chain of smoke shops in eastern Ohio and Virginia, called Delta 8 and Delta 10 “THC’S little brother.”
“It gets people a little high,” he said. “And it feels like the real thing to some people.”
When asked if he believes the compounds are legal, he referred to the 2018 farm bill, which permits most products that don’t contain THC Delta 9. However, individual states are free to set their own rules.
“A game of whack-a-mole”
Court cases on the issue have not offered clarity.
A federal court recently allowed a California company to copyright its Delta 8 products on the grounds that nonsynthetic Delta 8 is permitted under the 2018 Farm Bill. But the ruling did not address the legality of consumable Delta 8 products and did not prevent states from approving Delta 8 bans.
Cannabis has hundreds of compounds and at least a dozen varieties of THC. Which means a ruling against Delta 8 and Delta 10 could set off a search for the next cannabis compound, said Jennifer Bard, a professor at the University of Cincinnati’s law school.
“It’s a game of whack-a-mole making legal distinctions between these different cannabinoids,” she said. pcooley@dispatch.com @Patrickacooley