Applications Opening Soon – Pennsylvania’s Up and Coming Marijuana Industry

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Wolf, however, feels apprehensive about granting full rights to the drug as he is unsure about health and economic effects, saying, “I think we can watch and see what happens in Colorado, Washington, and Oregon. I think we have to wait and see.”

The state site for the Governor of Pennsylvania provides additional insight into the details of legalizing medical marijuana. According to Pennsylvania Secretary of Health, Karen Murphy, “The program is expected to be implemented by 2018 and will allow Pennsylvanians with serious medical conditions that are identified in Act 16 to have access to medical marijuana.”

Currently, the state’s new Office of Medical Marijuana has eight employees, one of which is a liaison who has started meeting with patients. In public discussions, 5,000 people commented on the program, with officials finding that pain and post-traumatic stress are the most common qualifying medical conditions. According to Murphy, “While this is a regulatory process, we always keep in mind this is a medically focused program.”

Patient Qualifications

To qualify, patients must have some type of terminal illness or, according to MPP, suffer from “cancer, HIV/AIDS, amyotrophic lateral sclerosis, Parkinson’s disease, multiple sclerosis, epilepsy, inflammatory bowel disease, neuropathies, Huntington’s disease, Crohn’s disease, post-traumatic stress disorder, intractable seizures, glaucoma, autism, sickle cell anemia, damage to the nervous tissue of the spinal cord with objective neurological indication of intractable spasticity, or severe chronic or intractable pain of neuropathic origin, or if conventional therapeutic intervention and opiate therapy is contraindicated or ineffective.”