Maryland Set to Cap Edible Potency

BY JAMES WYCHE

What's up Munkey Fam, hope everyone had a fun and safe 420 holiday. Also, I want to congratulate all NY readers on now having recreational legalization hopefully Maryland will soon follow. Unfortunately in Maryland, we are dealing with some changes in our medical system courtesy of the MMCC. This change greatly impacts a large section of patients in the state that use anything edible. The MMCC defines an edible as "any medical cannabis product intended for human consumption by oral ingestion that dissolves or disintegrates in the mouth" Not only does this impact infused drinks and "chews" that are available but it will negatively impact the RSO production in the state. This bulletin was made on 4/19, I found it ironic they made the ruling the day before the stoner holiday.

For those of you who are asking "what the hell is RSO?", well give me a moment and I'll explain. RSO is an acronym for Rick Simpson Oil which is named after the inventor of the same name who used this form of cannabis oil to help treat his skin cancer in 2003. Almost 20 years later RSO now is primarily used by patients using RSO caps or can be used to make homemade edibles. The age group that uses RSO the most in my experience is the elderly. They say it helps them with sleep, managing pain, and helping with appetite. In addition to the elderly, I have patients who are battling both physical and mental illnesses that depend on RSO. Using RSO, they've managed to ween off their pharmaceutical drugs which were giving them worse side effects than any cannabis product could ever. The cannabis producers in Maryland within the past 4 to 6 months had released 1000mg capsules because of the demand especially from patients battling serious illnesses like cancer or dealing with chronic pain from major surgeries. Now with these changes, the patient will have to either make edibles at home or pay for even more products at a lower potency.

Thankfully all higher potency edibles are still available on the market but by July 18 all high potency edibles must be gone from the shelves of dispensaries or be destroyed. A few patients that visit the dispensary I work at have told me they've gotten multiple patients together to write to the MMCC and plead their case as to why this new rule will negatively impact them. In my opinion, this new rule was the byproduct of the fear of a child or pet eating a patient's medicine. This is just another way for the MMCC to keep their hands clean because they don't want to be sued. Also, it is the opinion of this author that patients have to do better concealing their medicine around their pets or children. Even though cannabis isn't going to kill anyone like if a child or dog ate Xanax, patients should treat it as such. Once you get your medicine whether it's RSO capsules, edibles, or bud itself we have to do our best to keep it out of the hands/mouths of people you don't want it to get into.

It's unfortunate Maryland patients who depend on high potency edibles and RSO, will soon face hurdles to consume cannabis. Fortunately, not every patient in Maryland's medical program needs high-potency edibles because they only care about the high and not the medicinal benefits they get. Again I feel bad for elderly patients, those with anxiety/ depression, and those patients I have who have had major surgeries involving rods and other bolts you find at Home Depot. I can already predict a wave of letters and phone calls the MMCC will have to take because of this new rule. I hope though that the MMCC can work with patients and can hear their reasoning as to why Maryland should keep high potency edibles available for patients.

Until next time Munkey Fam