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The Louisiana Senate on Thursday approved a bill to give patients in the state\u2019s medical marijuana program the ability to legally smoke cannabis flower.<\/p>\n
The move, which comes a week after an effort to more broadly legalize marijuana in the state stalled<\/a> in the House of Representatives, would mark a significant expansion to the current medical cannabis law if enacted. As it stands, patients are able to vaporize cannabis preparations via a \u201cmetered-dose inhaler,\u201d but they cannot access whole-plant flower and smoking is not allowed.<\/p>\n The legislation<\/a> cleared the Senate by a vote of 26-11 after previously being approved by the House.<\/a> It would have headed directly to the desk of Gov. John Bel Edwards (D), but the body quickly brought the measure back up and added technical amendments, meaning it must first go back to the other chamber for concurrence.<\/p>\n The governor of Minnesota signed a large-scale spending bill on Tuesday that similarly includes a provision to add smokable marijuana to that state\u2019s medical cannabis program<\/a>.<\/p>\n In Louisiana, senators also took up a companion House bill<\/a> on Wednesday to tax medical cannabis flower. The body approved a floor amendment to extend the state\u2019s general sales tax and steer the resulting revenue to infrastructure projects and utilities, but it was recommitted to committee before a final vote on the legislation was held.<\/p>\n Meanwhile, a Senate committee approved a House-passed bill to decriminalize possession of small amounts of marijuana<\/a> on Tuesday, sending it to the full chamber for final passage. That measure<\/a> would make it so possession of up to 14 grams of cannabis would be punishable by a $100 fine without the threat of jail time.<\/p>\n On Monday, the House passed a resolution<\/a> requesting the legislature conduct a formal study on the impacts of recreational marijuana legalization prior to the start of the 2022 session. It was approved by a vote of 63-27.<\/p>\n Numerous cannabis-related bills have been advancing in the conservative state this year, the most far-reaching of which is a proposal to legalize marijuana for adult-use. It hit a dead end last week, however, when the House defeated a companion bill to tax recreational sales. Its sponsor then pulled the legalization measure and a separate complementary bill on licensing fees.<\/p>\n \u2014 The governor said in a radio appearance last week that while full legalization hit a roadblock this year, he does believe it \u201cis going to happen in Louisiana eventually<\/a>.\u201d He also spoke about the decriminalization and medical cannabis flower bills as examples of reform\u2019s general momentum.<\/p>\n The developments on various cannabis-related legislation comes on the heels of a new poll<\/a> showing that constituents in some of the most firmly Republican districts in the state support legalizing marijuana.<\/p>\n When it comes to legalization, while advocates generally expected resistance from Edwards, who has repeatedly expressed opposition to the reform, he did say last month that he has \u201cgreat interest\u201d in the legalization proposal<\/a>, and he pledged to take a serious look at its various provisions.<\/p>\n Last year, the legislature significantly expanded the state\u2019s medical marijuana program by passing a bill that allows physicians to recommend cannabis to patients for any debilitating condition that they deem fit instead of from the limited list of maladies that\u2019s used under current law.<\/p>\n Edwards\u00a0signed the measure in June 2020<\/a>\u00a0and\u00a0it took effect weeks later<\/a>.<\/p>\n Two other recent polls\u2014including one personally commissioned by a top Republican lawmaker\u2014have found that\u00a0a majority of voters are in favor of legalizing cannabis<\/a>\u00a0for adult use.<\/p>\n Top Federal Health Official Touts Psychedelics\u2019 Therapeutic Benefits And Slams Marijuana Scheduling<\/a><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n\n The post Louisiana Senate Approves Smokable Medical Marijuana Bill<\/a> appeared first on Marijuana Moment<\/a>.<\/p>\n
The Louisiana Senate on Thursday approved a bill to give patients in the state\u2019s medical marijuana program the ability to legally smoke cannabis flower. The move, which comes a week after an effort to more broadly legalize marijuana in the state stalled in the House of Representatives, would mark aContinue Reading<\/a><\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":459,"featured_media":47909,"comment_status":"false","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[18,81],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/47908"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/459"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=47908"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/47908\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":47910,"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/47908\/revisions\/47910"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/47909"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=47908"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=47908"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=47908"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
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\nRead More: Louisiana Senate Approves Smokable Medical Marijuana Bill<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"