Now approaching the fourth year since Louisiana lawmakers passed medical cannabis legislation, patients have been stuck in a frustrating and painstaking wait as treatment remains unavailable.
On Monday, patients and medical cannabis advocates received another disappointing update on the lengthy regulatory and testing process, potentially leaving the recently purported summer 2019 start date in jeopardy. Still unable to obtain treatment from regional pharmacies, there is still no definite timeline for when medical-grade cannabis products will finally come to the Bayou State.
Gathered at the Louisiana Department of Agriculture and Forestry’s public stakeholders meeting patients, regulators, state-sanctioned growers, and the universities overseeing the process convened to discuss the current state of the stymied medical cannabis program.
Louisiana Patients Grow Weary of More Delays to Medical Cannabis Access
Katie Corkern, a mother and medical cannabis advocate, has pleaded for years with Louisiana lawmakers to make treatment available for her 12-year-old son, Connor, who’s been suffering from debilitating seizures.
At the most recent meeting, she said her son has been to the hospital 15 times since lawmakers passed medical cannabis legislation. Despite Connor’s neurologist recommending that he use medical pot to help control his seizures, Corkern has been unable to get him treatment.
“We’re waiting, and Connor doesn’t deserve this,” she said at the meeting. “Neither do the citizens that you all don’t get to see.”
Passed back in 2015, these frustrating delays are due in part to the particularly restrictive medical cannabis framework that Louisiana lawmakers have implemented. For instance, medical-grade marijuana is only allowed to be grown at the agricultural centers at LSU and Southern University, leaving the entire system in the hands of only a couple of cultivators.
Over 1,300 days have passed