Somewhere between three and six million people in the United States suffer from fibromyalgia, a chronic pain syndrome that doctors scarcely understand and struggle to effectively treat. But for years, many fibromyalgia patients have shared their stories and experiences treating their symptoms with cannabis.

Yet while patients frequently self-report using cannabis to manage their fibromyalgia, there are only a few clinical studies that have assessed whether cannabis can be an effective treatment for the disease. The studies that do exist, however, all present positive results. And a new investigation into the characteristics, safety and effectiveness of medical cannabis therapy for fibromyalgia just added more evidence to the pile. According to the authors of that study, a team of medical researchers in Israel, cannabis may be a suitable treatment option for fibromyalgia.

Marijuana Helped Reduce Pain for 81 Percent of Fibromyalgia Patients

“Safety and Efficacy of Medical Cannabis in Fibromyalgia,” a study published this month in the Journal of Clinical Medicine, assessed 367 fibromyalgia patients’ use of cannabis over a six-month period. Of those patients, 301 were women, and at the end of the six-month assessment period, 261 patients participated in a survey. (Some patients stopped their medical cannabis treatments.) That

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The U.S. Federal Aviation Administration has issued an advisory to clarify the agency’s cannabis policy for pilots. In a medical advisory published in the current issue of FAA Safety Briefing, FAA Federal Air Surgeon Dr. Michael Berry noted (in dated language) that as cannabis legalization in its various forms continues to spread across the country, the flying community has repeatedly shown interest in marijuana and CBD.

“The Federal Air Surgeon’s office has received a number of inquiries about marijuana, due to the recent increase in the number of states around the country that have approved its use for medical and recreational purposes,” Berry wrote. “Specifically, airmen are concerned about the safety of cannabidiol (CBD) oil use and how such use impacts an airman’s medical certificate. Be aware that federal law — not state law — governs FAA medical and pilot certification.“

Berry reminded pilots that they could be subject to drug screenings that detect the use of marijuana and could affect their certification to fly.

“The U.S. Department of Transportation (DOT) drug test includes THC, and its presence at defined levels constitutes a positive drug test,” he wrote in the advisory.

Pilots Warned Against CBD Use

Berry also acknowledged the

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Last week, the US Border Control announced a gigantic drug bust had been made by Mexican authorities using technology and training from US government agencies. Mexican officials torched a 13 square mile marijuana growing operation six miles from the US-Mexico border in La Rumorosa, Baja California. Law enforcement officials destroyed more than 42,000 plants that weighed 70,000 pounds.

“This significant drug seizure is an excellent example of the effective collaboration among law enforcement agencies in the United States and Mexico,” said a US Customs and Border Protection communiqué about the massive destruction of cannabis, whose cannabis supposedly would have retailed at $276,900,000 USD.

The announcement comes at a politically weighted moment. President Donald Trump has made enforcing border security one of his top issues in 2019, even going so far to shut down the federal government for 35 days in the hopes of wresting an agreement from House Democrats to fund the way (the plan failed).

More recently, Trump announced that he had come to “the agreement that everybody says I don’t have” when it came to talks with Mexico over expanding its role in stopping the flow of Central American refugees, who the president blames for high crime rates

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Shoppers Drug Mart sees cannabis and blockchain technology as a perfect combination to get more doctors on board with prescribing the drug to patients in Canada. Ken Weisbrod, Shoppers’ vice-president of business development, said the company signed a deal with TruTrace Technologies for a pilot program to provide software to track medical cannabis from seed to final product. As Canada looks to become a global medical cannabis leader, tools like blockchain will be crucial for legal pot to be traceable and accountable for patients and for practitioners to feel confident about it as a treatment, Weisbrod said.

iAnthus cancels options plans, aims to reissue at higher strike price

iAnthus Capital Holdings is walking back plans to issue stock options to its senior executives at a lower rate. The U.S. multi-state operator said 60 per cent of the options that have been issued in 2019 will be cancelled, effective Monday, and that the company plans to reissue them sometime later at a strike price of at least $7.50 a share. Last week, the company offered an apology to shareholders after it decided to cancel stock options on June 6 earmarked for many of its senior executives before issuing new options at

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According to a new ruling from a California appeals court,  prison inmates who possess small amounts of marijuana are not guilty of a felony crime. According to NPR, the court ruled that because marijuana is legal in the state, it can’t be a felony in prison.

The ruling from a panel of the 3rd District Court of Appeals in Sacramento overturns the convictions of five inmates who had been found guilty of possessing marijuana.”The plain language of Proposition 64 is clear,” said the court. “[P]ossession of less than one ounce of cannabis in prison or a similar penal institution is not a felony.”

In response to the ruling, the California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation emphasized that inmates are still banned from smoking or ingesting marijuana in its prisons.

“While the court’s decision is still under review, we want to be clear that drug use and sales within state prisons remains prohibited,” said CDCR Press Secretary Vicky Waters. She added that the agency will “evaluate this decision with an eye towards maintaining health and security within our institutions.”

Despite their conclusion that possessing cannabis does not constitute a felony, the court said prison authorities could still ban

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A bipartisan group of 20 state and territorial attorney generals has called for the passage of a federal bill that would give cannabis industry businesses access to the U.S. banking system. In a letter sent to leaders of both the U.S. Senate and House of Representatives on Thursday, the governors urged the passage of the Secure and Fare (SAFE) Banking Act of 2019 (H.R. 1595).

Gov. Gretchen Whitmer of Michigan, one of the governors who signed the letter, said that voters have made it clear that it is time for a new approach to cannabis policy.

“Michiganders turned out in historic numbers in this last election to legalize the use of recreational marijuana, and we must respect the will of the voters,” Whitmer said. “There is an inherent danger for businesses operating in an all-cash business because financial institutions are unable to accept the risks and penalties associated with providing service to this industry under current law. This letter sends a clear message to Congress that our states are looking for a real solution to a real problem, and we support them to get this done.”  

Cannabis Industry Denied Access to Banking

Due to federal drug and money laundering

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‘We’re hiring more production supervision, packaging people, logistics’.

With the federal government laying out the timetable for the legalization of cannabis edibles and topicals, a P.E.I. company is moving quickly to take a piece of the market.

That market is estimated to be worth $2.7 billion, and Charlottetown-based Dosecann has been at work preparing for the opening of that market for some time.

– Read the entire article at CBC News.

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New York’s current legislative session ends on Wednesday, June 19, and it’s the last chance lawmakers will have to vote on marijuana legalization. Over the weekend, New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo held talks with Senate and Assembly members to discuss possible action on a legalization proposal. Lawmakers and the governor failed to reach an agreement on Sunday, but it’s possible a deal could materialize on Monday. If it does, Gov. Cuomo will have to initiate a special procedure to rush the bill to a vote by the Wednesday deadline. Marijuana legalization advocates are currently demonstrating in front of the capitol in Albany to push Gov. Cuomo and New York lawmakers to take advantage of the last-second opportunity.

Gov. Cuomo Could Rush Vote on Legal Marijuana

A bill to legalize marijuana in New York that was pronounced dead earlier this year has suddenly surged back to life. At first, it looked like the proposal didn’t have enough votes to pass in the Senate. Lawmakers were unable to come to a compromise on taxes and other regulations, and Gov. Cuomo told reporters in June that it wouldn’t be feasible to push for the bill’s passage this session.

But some of the bill’s

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Virginia Attorney General Mark Herring is getting impatient waiting for the state’s lawmakers to move forward on marijuana legalization. On Saturday, he published an op-ed in Virginia newspaper the Daily Press advising them to “decriminalize possession of small amounts of marijuana, address past convictions and start moving toward legal and regulated adult use.”

Perhaps the intended audience of the editorial is Virginia’s House Republicans, who have effectively blocked most legislation that would open access to cannabis and reduce its related penalties for possession in the state. Though hopes were high at the start of the year, the state assembly declined to pass two different plans to legalize cultivation and personal use.

Even while many states around the country march forward towards cannabis regulation, many conservative legislators still see the issue as a potential landmine in the upcoming November elections.

In a rare moment of forward motion, the Virginia Senate did pass a bill allowing school nurses to administer medicinal cannabis to students in February. During the same week, SB 1157 got the go ahead, authorizing nurses and doctors to prescribe THC-A and CBD oil and lays the groundwork for future regulations around medicinal cannabis in topical, capsule, lozenge, and suppository

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Chinese drug enforcement authorities believe that the legalization of cannabis in Canada and parts of the United States has led to an increase in marijuana smuggling into the country and poses a “new threat to China,” according to a report from CNN. Liu Yuejin, the deputy director of the China National Narcotics Control Commission, said in a press conference in Beijing on Monday that the country of nearly 1.4 billion people now has 24,000 cannabis users, a figure that spiked 25 percent in 2018. Liu acknowledged that there are “few cannabis users” in relation to the total population.

“In two years, we have found increasing cannabis trafficked from North America to China,” he said.

Liu reported that China had intercepted 115 packages containing cannabis that had been sent to the country through international postal services in 2018. The parcels contained a total of “55 kilograms (1940 ounces) of cannabis and cannabis products.” Liu did not specify how many of the packages had been sent from Canada and the United States.

Most of the individuals suspected of being connected to the smuggled packages were either foreign students or Chinese nationals who had returned to the country after studying abroad, according to

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