Israel's new rules might spur growth in medical cannabis industry

The Ministry of Health is giving specialist physicians broader discretion when administering medical cannabis and removing some restrictions that had been in place.

The changes “help increase the medical autonomy of the specialist physicians while also improving availability and reducing bureaucracy for patients who require medical cannabis,” the ministry said in a statement announcing the changes.

The new measures, which are effective immediately, are only the first step of a major regulatory overhaul of Israel’s medical marijuana program.

Further changes will take effect in late March.

The main points of January’s update include:

• Allowing specialist doctors more discretion to administer medical cannabis.
• Canceling the stipulation that medical marijuana be administered only as a last resort, in certain cases.
• Changes to when patients suffering from moderate to severe PTSD are eligible for medical marijuana licenses.

• Israeli marijuana producer IM Cannabis Corp. said in December that the full regulatory overhaul faced a delay because of the Israel-Hamas war.

  “As I had said when the overhaul of the cannabis regulation was first published in August, we believed it could change the face of the medical cannabis market in Israel, facilitating the access of medical cannabis for many new patients. We still believe this to be the case,” CEO Oren Shuster said in a December statement.

  More significant changes are coming to the Israeli market in March.

  Those include:

• Transitioning to a “prescription” system and away from a “personal license” model.

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Image by jcomp on Freepik

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