Author: News Room

Bipartisan and bicameral congressional lawmakers have reached an agreement on a large-scale defense bill that contains a House GOP-led section to fund studies into the therapeutic use of psychedelics such as psilocybin and MDMA for military service members. Following negotiations, lawmakers released the conference report for the 2024 National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA) on Wednesday evening, maintaining psychedelics research provisions championed by Rep. Morgan Luttrell (R-TX) that were attached to the House version over the summer. The report notes, however, that the House negotiators receded on a separate section to create a medical cannabis pilot program for veterans. The psychedelics…

A top GOP federal lawmaker says that if Washington, D.C. wants to legalize marijuana sales, it should be allowed to do so without congressional interference. Rep. James Comer (R-KY), chairman of the House Oversight and Accountability Committee, said on Wednesday that D.C. Mayor Muriel Bowser (D) raised the congressional rider blocking her District from enacting a commercial cannabis market during a meeting focused on local crime issues. “We’re looking at everything. We’ve got our policy people looking at that,” Comer said, adding that Bowser previously called his attention to the marijuana sales blockade during a hearing in his committee in…

“I think all of us are interested in how aggressive they can be with the timeframe since we had delay after delay up to this point.” By Alander Rocha, Alabama Reflector Companies seeking to build all-inclusive medical cannabis facilities began making their cases to the Alabama Medical Cannabis Commission Tuesday. Presentations will run from Tuesday until Friday, and the commission will award the licenses next week. Applicants seeking integrated facility licenses, which would grow, process and distribute medical cannabis, were allotted up to 45 minutes to speak to the commission. Most companies stressed their ability to quickly get products to…

Ohio’s voter-approved marijuana legalization initiative took effect on Thursday, and despite ongoing wrangling by state lawmakers to modify significant portions of the law, some provisions—including legal use, possession and home cultivation of cannabis—have immediate impacts. Voters solidly approved the legalization ballot measure, Issue 2, on a 57–42 margin last month. But soon after, Republicans in the state Senate indicated their plans to gut the bill by eliminating home grow, reducing legal possession and allowable THC limits, raising sales tax, criminalizing the use and possession of marijuana obtained outside of a licensed retailer and steering funding away from social equity programs…

New York-based 22nd Century Group said it intends to sell off its GVB Biopharma unit, a CBD maker, with the price tag estimated at $2.25 million – after having purchased the Las Vegas-based company for roughly $60 million less than 18 months ago.GVB provides drug development services and is a contract supplier of CBD and other hemp derivatives to the pharmaceutical and consumer goods industries.22nd Century said it is selling GVB to Specialty Acquisition Corp., a Nevada business “affiliated with current GVB employees,” to cut costs, according to a press release. The purchase price includes $1 million in cash, and…

In a stunning reversal, Ohio’s GOP-controlled Senate passed a revised bill that in many ways would expand the voter-approved marijuana legalization law that goes into effect on Thursday—by allowing adults to start buying cannabis from existing medical dispensaries in as soon as 90 days, maintaining home cultivation rights and providing for automatic expungements of prior convictions, among other changes. Just days after the Senate General Government Committee advanced legislation to fundamentally undo key provisions of the cannabis initiative voters passed at the ballot last month—proposing to eliminate the home grow option and delaying legalization for at least one year until…

Georgia recently became the first U.S. state to allow pharmacies to sell medical marijuana, with nearly 120 facilities applying to sell cannabis oil as of October. But now the federal Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) is warning pharmacies that dispensing THC is unlawful because it remains a Schedule I drug. “All DEA registrants, including DEA-registered pharmacies, are required to abide by all relevant federal laws and regulations,” says a copy of a letter sent to a Georgia pharmacy by Matthew J. Strait, a DEA deputy assistant administrator in the agency’s Diversion Control Division. “A DEA-registered pharmacy may only dispense controlled substances…

“I look forward to joining the incredible team at the Cannabis Compliance Board and executing the governor’s agenda to ethically regulate this burgeoning industry.” By Dana Gentry, Nevada Current Gov. Joe Lombardo (R) announced Tuesday that James Humm will be the new executive director of the Cannabis Compliance Board. The position is currently held by Tyler Klimas, who is leaving to start a cannabis and hemp consulting company. Klimas is bound by a one-year cooling off period during which he cannot represent certain establishments in the state. “I approached the governor’s office in September and let them know I’d be…

Lawmakers in Lubbock, Texas have officially approved a resolution to put a local marijuana decriminalization initiative on the ballot next spring after declining to enact on the reform legislatively. The Lubbock City Council voted on Tuesday to schedule a special election on the issue for May 4, 2024. This comes one month after legislators unanimously rejected the decriminalization proposal that was put on the agenda after activists submitted enough signatures to force its consideration. The committee behind the marijuana initiative first filed paperwork for the Freedom Act Lubbock ordinance with the city secretary in August. After activists turned in more than…

Results of a new clinical trial published by the American Medical Association “suggest efficacy and safety” of psilocybin-assisted psychotherapy for treatment of bipolar II disorder, a mental health condition often associated with debilitating and difficult-to-treat depressive episodes. “The 15 participants in this trial had well-documented treatment-resistant BDII depression of marked severity and a lengthy duration of the current depressive episode,” authors wrote. After seven psychotherapy sessions, one involving a single dose of psilocybin, the paper says, study subjects “displayed strong and persistent antidepressant effects, with no signal of worsening mood instability or increased suicidality.” In the nonrandomized controlled study, which…