Pennsylvania Ranked on National Medical Cannabis Report Card by Sven Hosford
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mericans for Safe Access Churgai says, “There was (ASA) is a Washington, plenty of room for improvement D.C.-based nonprofit in every state. States were graded spearheading the effort to ensure on patient rights, parental rights safe and legal access to cannabis and protections, employment for therapeutic use and research. protections for patients, and In a new ASA State of the States pediatric patients and their annual report card on the efaccess to medicine.” They were ficacy of each state’s medical also graded on patient access, Debbie Churgai cannabis laws and programs, the affordability of the products and commonwealth did well in patient rights other costs, and product safety. “Taxes are a and civil protections, but not so much with huge issue. Sometimes, patients are paying access to medicine. Executive Director more in taxes than they are for the actual Debbie Churgai says they’ve been working medicine. We totally advocate for no taxes on it for 20 years, always focused on the for medical patients,” she says. patient. “Our mission is to ensure safe and Pennsylvania’s grade was C+, which may legal access to medical cannabis. Educatseem average, but Churgai notes, “We had ing lawmakers, educating medical profesto grade on a curve. Every state’s score was sionals, educating the public, ending the so low, every state would have received a stigma, getting more research out—these D.” Maine was awarded the only B, Illinois are all of our missions here.” the only B-. Pennsylvania’s C+ was the
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third-highest score, the same as cannabis powerhouses like Colorado and California. “Pennsylvania did okay compared to the other states,” she says. Churgai describes how the grades were assigned. “It’s a very, very lengthy process. We started many, many months ago. We added two new sections, one on affordability and one on social health and equity, which is also a big, hot topic these days.” This includes ensuring there is no list of qualifying conditions. “We believe that a doctor should be able to recommend for anything that they see fit,” she says. Pennsylvania’s program got off to a rocky start after dispensary doors opened in February 2018. The biggest problem was the unpredicted popularity of cannabis as medicine. Growers that planned on 50,000 patients in the first year were stunned when more than 100,000 people signed up. According to the report, today Pennsylvania has 384,254 registered patients, one of only five states with more than 300,000, which means 2.68 percent of the total population has a card. Access remains a problem, with a person-to-retail-outlet ratio of 2,403. Churgai says, “In Oregon, it’s about 50 patients per dispensary.” According to Churgai, “Pennsylvania did well on patient rights and civil protections, with an 80 out of 100 score, which is pretty good compared to a lot of other states. And program functionality, which is about purchase limits, possession limits, telemedicine, caregiver standards, things like that. They did decently in consumer protection and product safety as well, where they got 148 out of 200. Pennsylvania is doing pretty good and they are making improvements. Every year they do try to improve the program. There are some great legislators who are really focusing on this.” Pennsylvania’s lowest scores are in access to medicine. “The [lack of] retail locations is probably a big one. [Lack of] personal cultivation is huge. That is really important for patients, as it helps with affordability. Pennsylvania lost 20 points for not having reciprocity,” says Churgai, which means
