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For more than 14 years, the tiny, poor Balkan country of North Macedonia has been trying to edge its way into the EU. Now, with just over two million inhabitants, and legislation to run a global medical cannabis market, North Macedonia is fighting corruption to prove that big things can come in very small packages.

In Macedonia, cannabis is illegal for recreational use. There are no personal use or decriminalization laws. It cannot be bought, sold, grown, or used legally by private residents for recreational purposes. Prison sentences for being caught breaking cannabis laws can go up to 10 years.

Medical cannabis in North Macedonia

In 2016, a North Macedonian Health Committee approved an amendment to the laws governing the control of psychotropic substances, allowing for cannabis to be used legally for medicinal purposes. Both ruling and opposition parties were in favor of the change. Part of the reasoning behind the necessity of the law, was to make it so that people who were already using such products illegally to self-medicate, could get better results with medical supervision.

The new laws allowed oils and extracts with .2% THC or lower to be sold without a prescription, and those containing greater than that amount to require a prescription. According to the law, the only doctors capable of writing prescriptions for cannabis products are: radiologists, oncologists, neurologists, and infectious disease specialists.

To give an idea where North Macedonians themselves stood on the issue of legalizing for medicinal use before it happened, a poll from the previous year published by the M-Prosepekt agency, found that 70% of those polled were for the legalization. This number was up 20% from a similar poll done in 2013.

Medical cannabis production in North Macedonia

Along with opening up the laws to allow for residents to have access to medical marijuana, North Macedonia also opened up its laws for the cultivation, production, and exportation of cannabis products.

In response to the COVID-19 emergency, the FDA is announcing a temporary policy regarding enforcement of the requirement for drug samples.

The U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) is issuing updated guidance to address questions they’ve received asking for clarification regarding their enforcement of requirements on the distribution of drug samples under the Prescription Drug Marketing Act (PDMA) of 1987 . The PDMA is part of the Federal Food, Drug, and Cosmetic Act, and the relevant implementing regulations regarding drug samples are in 21 CFR part 203 (part 203), subpart D.

The relevance of this modification affects health care providers, patients affected by COVID-19 and related conditions, and the life science companies themselves, according to information highlighted in The National Law Review. 

The drug sample revisions, issued by the FDA earlier in June, affect how licensed practitioners provide care and consultation to their clients during a public health emergency. In response to the COVID-19 emergency, the FDA is announcing a temporary policy regarding enforcement of the requirement for drug samples. This policy covers samples only to be sent to the requesting healthcare practitioner licensed to prescribe the drug, or to a professional at the pharmacy of a hospital or health care entity.

Under the current FDA guidance during the public health emergency (PHE), the FDA clarified drug samples can not be distributed to licensed retail pharmacies. That set of regulations has effectively not changed.  

Beyond the 2.3 million cases of COVID-19 in the U.S and the more than 120,000 coronavirus deaths, as of mid-June, there exists an urgent medical situation. The treatment of medical personnel is an additional pandemic element, complicated by the rapid spread of the virus in the population.

Burnout has hit many professionals, but most of all, the medical communities from doctors and nurses to emergency medical technicians. Despite all of the pre-planning, there was little contingency planning for the sudden influx of new patients.

Understanding burnout

Patients are being treated during current pressing conditions by professionals who are having to work with masks and protective gear. Both patients and medical personnel have limited access to their families. And many medical professionals have become sick, too. That makes for a perfect storm for clinical burnout.

Medical alert fatigue and the critical need for health professionals to prioritize a high level of both data and respondent care are among the priorities. Dr. Noor Najid el Mehiri, a family physician and the head of the Ministry of Health and Prevention of the UAE, pointed to several challenges.

“The sheer volume of information that is generated and the fact that it is changing very rapidly makes it a challenge for clinicians to digest. We needed to make sure that the processes we put in place, in terms of information management, were practical and efficient for our physicians and nurses,” she mentioned.

The coronavirus pandemic has resulted in long periods of isolation, social distancing mandates and disruption to lifestyles across the globe.

According to a new United Nations (U.N.) report, this has caused an increase in the worldwide demand for cannabis, with notable sale surges on the dark web. The U.N. also noted that cannabis remains the main drug that causes people to enter the criminal justice system.

The U.N. Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC) recently released its World Drug Report for 2020 and found that about 269 million people used drugs worldwide in 2018, a 30 per cent increase from 2009.

But because COVID-19 has closed multiple borders and disrupted drug supply chains, the pandemic may lead to drug shortages on the streets. The concern is that this could cause dangerous implications, including impure drugs and price hikes.

“Vulnerable and marginalized groups, youth, women and the poor pay the price for the world drug problem,” noted UNODC executive director Ghada Waly. “The COVID-19 crisis and economic downturn threaten to compound drug dangers further still, when our health and social systems have been brought to the brink and our societies are struggling to cope,” Waly added.

As calls for criminal justice reform sweep the nation, California is taking steps to reverse some effects of the war on drugs, which continues to disproportionately impact people of color.

California’s 58 county district attorneys had a deadline of Wednesday, July 1, to accept or challenge the state’s recommendation to clear the records of some 191,090 past marijuana convictions. The procedure was triggered by Proposition 64, a 2016 measure that legalized cannabis and reduced penalties for related crimes, and by Assembly Bill 1793, which requires justice officials to purge eligible crimes from people’s records.

Because local prosecutors agreed with the vast majority of the state’s recommendations, tens of thousands of Californians are now free of criminal records for cannabis charges. In many cases, the charges for the cases in question are no longer crimes, but the criminal records still could have meant lost job or housing opportunities or, for immigrants, led to their deportation.

“I think there’s been recognition by a lot of people that we needed to change things,” said Christopher Gardner, public defender for San Bernardino County.

Southern California DAs alone moved to dismiss or downgrade more than 100,000 marijuana charges as the July 1 deadline approached. In some cases, they found even more eligible cases than those flagged by the state. Riverside County, for example, recently adjusted 26,424 cannabis convictions — nearly four times more than the number identified by California Attorney General Xavier Becerra.

Sleep is easily disrupted by the state of our mental health. That being the case, it makes sense that people are reporting increased issues with their sleep habits, having more vivid dreams, having less restful sleep and experiencing more insomnia during the past couple of months.

People usually struggle with their sleep habits. According to Donn Posner, president of Sleepwell Associates, an adjunct clinical associate professor at the Stanford University School of Medicine, about 35 per cent of people struggle with recurring bouts of insomnia. Now that people are coping with potential dangers posed to their health with COVID-19, the economy and social distancing pressures, the world’s current situation is a perfect recipe for sleep disorders.

When it comes to health workers, recent statistics show that the pandemic has affected both their sleep and health dramatically. A survey conducted by Sleep Standards found that, on average, healthcare workers are sleeping five hours a night. Forty-one per cent of those polled are experiencing insomnia, 27 per cent are dealing with nightmares, and only 21 per cent report no sleep issues.

Could cannabis help manage these symptoms of insomnia? Studies and anecdotal evidence suggest that it could.

A recent study from the University of Western Australia found that cannabis could provide an effective treatment for those who suffer from acute insomnia, specifically when the type of weed consumed is made up of a blend of THC and CBD. Patients treated with this kind of cannabis reported sleeping for more hours, falling asleep more quickly and getting back to sleep with more ease after waking up in the middle of the night.

Health Minister Stephen Donnelly says he stands by a 2017 interview in which he admitted to smoking cannabis and visiting a strip club.

The Fianna Fail TD told Hot Press magazine he had tried marijuana – and was open to the idea of making it legal.

Minister Donnelly, 44, also hinted at experimenting with other substances during a Q&A interview given after he left the Social Democrats before joining Fianna Fail.

When asked if he’d ever tried any other drugs Minister Donnelly replied: “I have many years ago. I have but that’s all the detail I’m going to go into.”

Pressed for an answer as to whether he had ever taken cocaine, he said: “I’m just not going to go down any of those lines if that’s OK.”

A bill that would fully legalize hemp production throughout Hawaii is only a few steps away from becoming law, although many are unhappy with its final form.

A joint meeting of the state Senate Judiciary and Ways and Means committees approved House Bill 1819, which would end the state’s current Industrial Hemp Pilot Program and replace it with a general purpose hemp production program designed by the U.S. Department of Agriculture.

Hemp was decriminalized nationwide by the USDA in 2018, but the state has not legalized its production beyond the Industrial Hemp Pilot Program, which has awarded licenses to growers throughout the state for the past two years. Of the 59 licenses awarded, 18 have been to growers on the Big Island.

However, Rep. Richard Creagan of Kailua-Kona, who co-introduced the bill and a similar measure in 2019, said the current state of the bill attracted criticism from hemp advocates who fear certain aspects of the measure will stifle production.

In particular, Creagan said, many testifiers took issue with a provision in the bill that sets mandatory buffer zones around any hemp production facility. Under the bill, hemp cannot be grown within 750 feet of property comprising a playground, child care facility or school nor within 250 feet of any existing residence not owned by the grower.

Municipalities in Illinois that have cannabis dispensaries will start seeing more money from recreational marijuana purchases. 

Cities, counties and villages that passed an individual 3% cannabis tax could start collecting it as of July 1. In the Metro East, that means more revenue for St. Clair County, Collinsville and Sauget, areas that passed a tax levy and where the region’s two current dispensaries operate.

Madison County won't collect an additional tax because county board members voted against allowing cannabis sales in unincorporated parts of the county last year.

While the tax increase will likely only be a few extra dollars per purchase, it represents more money for local city and county budgets at a time when some municipalities in the region have laid off workers or considered doing so because of the economic damage caused by the coronavirus.

So far, Collinsville has avoided layoffs by using the taxes it collects from cannabis sales to offset drops in other revenue sources, like sales tax, said City Manager Mitch Bair.

In Australia, the NT Farmers Association (NTFA) is encouraging agricultural producers in the Territory to take a crack at growing industrial hemp now that it is legal to do so with a licence.

The Northern Territory Government planted its first crop of industrial hemp in 2016, but it wasn’t until May 2019 that the Territory’s Hemp Industry Bill was tabled. The bill passed in August last year and the Hemp Industry Act and accompanying regulations came into effect in early May.

Now things are good to go, NT Farmers Association, the peak body for all plant-based industries in the Northern Territory, has been keen to promote the crop as an option for the Northern Territory’s farmers. It recently became a founding member of the Australia Hemp Council and has been working with researchers and industry to develop the NT’s competitive advantage.

One of the advantages the Territory has is the potential for two crops a year –  one potentially producing viable seed via a dry season (May–October) crop, and supplying that to other hemp farmers across Australia for summer planting.

“Hemp is an innovative new broadacre cropping opportunity which produces a versatile, environmentally sustainable and profitable products,” said the Association in a recent Facebook post. “NTFA are keen to work with interested producers to make this new opportunity a reality, so if you are keen to find out more or get in touch, email Andrew on kido@ntfarmers.org.au.”

The U.S. Hemp Industries Association (HIA) has appointed two new members to its board of directors. HIA named Tim Gordon, Chief Science Officer at CBD maker Functional Remedies, and Todd Runestad, an editor at the New Hope Network & Natural Products Insider website, to board positions, the Association announced in a press release.

“The addition of these two on our already stellar board creates the foundation needed as hemp industries expand globally,” said HIA President Rick Trojan of Colorado-based Hemp Road Trip.

Since the beginning of the year, marijuana companies have seen dramatic declines due to concerns regarding oversupply in Canada and the uncertainty of legalization in the U.S. Year to date as of June 28, the ETFMG Alternative Harvest ETF (NYSEMKT:MJ), an exchange-traded fund tracking the performance of pot stocks, has declined by more than 25%. During the same period, the S&P 500 index fell by less than 7%.

Monday, June 29, West Virginia officially announced the plan to reopen their application process for medical cannabis testing labs so that more labs can get registered and their medical cannabis testing program can get off the ground.

“The West Virginia Department of Health and Human Resources, Bureau for Public Health today announced its Office of Medical Cannabis will resume accepting permit applications for medical cannabis laboratories,” their press release explains about the new change and what to expect. “Laboratory permits are not limited in number and the application process will remain open indefinitely.”

As of now, the state will be accepting applications for an undefined amount of time, and there is no cap on the amount of licenses they will offer. It is not clear if there will eventually be a cap, but the problem currently is not too many applicants, but rather a lack thereof.

“This is a key step in the process to make medical cannabis available to West Virginians with serious medical conditions,” said Jason Frame, Director of the Office of Medical Cannabis, when questioned about the new program. “We and many others continue to work toward a goal of providing eligible West Virginia residents the ability to procure quality-tested medical cannabis.”

Originally, the application process was open for two months, ending February 18 of this year. West Virginia Public Broadcasting reports that during that time, only one business applied for a license, so the process had to be reopened.

The hemp industry prides itself on being more sustainable, but behind that image there’s still waste and room for improvement.

In theory, farming hemp should not be considered damaging to the earth at all. In fact, hemp can be regenerative to the soil on which it’s farmed.

Yet due to the dramatic consumer demand that companies are rushing to meet, many companies (and thus farmers) are now focused on making as much hemp as possible leaving little to no attention on its quality or the soil on which it was grown on. Our legislation is to blame as well: the law which legalized hemp can lead to the forced excessive destruction of perfectly healthy hemp plants. 

Jamaica has a very long history with the cannabis plant. Cannabis is a big part of the culture in Jamaica, is used for religious purposes throughout the country, and grows very well there.

Some of the best cannabis on the planet is cultivated in Jamaica, and the island nation is home to an emerging medical cannabis industry.

Adult-use cannabis remains illegal in Jamaica; however, a growing number of suffering patients are able to find relief through Jamaica’s medical cannabis program.

Soon, patients in Jamaica will be able to purchase cannabis in a new way that harnesses technology.

A survey of more than 1,000 people with multiple sclerosis has found extensive use of complementary and alternative medicine – including the use of cannabis.

Researchers at Oregon Health & Science University conducted the survey of MS patients in Oregon and Southwest Washington in 2018, with the results published in the journal Multiple Sclerosis and Related Disorders.

Around 30% reported they had used cannabis in a variety of forms and of those people, close to 71% found it “very beneficial”.

The survey followed up on a similar study back in 2001 in the same regions. Other key findings:

Lead author of the study, Elizabeth Silbermann, M.D., said more research is needed so neurologists can discuss with patients what does and doesn’t work. Dr. Silbermann recognised the change in patient-doctor dynamics that will make this possible.

Maine marijuana regulators have created new rules about sample collections that are expected to make the state's testing system less burdensome.

Maine approved adult use marijuana in 2016 and has been in the process of crafting rules and regulations about sales since. The coronavirus pandemic has slowed the rollout in recent months.

The Maine Office of Marijuana Policy said the state now has the ability to license and regulate sample collectors. The collectors will be workers who collect samples of marijuana and marijuana products for testing on behalf of marijuana testing facilities and other adult marijuana use establishments, the office said.

The testing facilities themselves were previously responsible for the collection of samples. The marijuana office said that would have been burdensome because of the size of the state.

The rules were emergency adopted and are effective until at least Sept. 22, the office said.

A tax code provision means the federal government profits more from state-by-state legalization than any nationwide model.

Marijuana legalization has been touted as a possible solution to the American economy, which has faced an uphill battle toward recovery following the coronavirus pandemic.  While legalizing marijuana won’t fix every financial woe, the added tax revenue generated through legal cannabis sales and licensing could provide a helpful boost.

In states where cannabis is illegal for adult-use, lawmakers have already pushed cannabis reform legislation with this mindset. Gov. Michelle Lujan Grisham expressed regret in April that New Mexico had not legalized recreational cannabis before the pandemic. Her reason? The state would have an additional $100 million in its budget and recent projections show New Mexico will have a $100 million budget deficit in the upcoming fiscal year.

Bipartisan legislators in New York and Pennsylvania have taken similar stances, seeing legal cannabis as a quick salve to economic wounds.

“It’s not enough to say the state doesn’t have money. We have to find it,” said New York state Sen. Jessica Ramos. “I believe legalizing marijuana can help.”

A new study found that higher long-term dietary intakes of flavonoids are associated with lower risks of Alzheimer’s disease and related dementias.

Researchers recently discovered that a low flavonoid intake was associated with Alzheimer’s risk, meaning a diet lacking berries, apples, tea, and other flavonoid rich foods could hold one of the keys to the disease.

The April 2020 study published in The American Journal of Clinical Nutrition found, “higher long-term dietary intakes of flavonoids are associated with lower risks of Alzheimer’s disease and related dementias (ADRD) in U.S. adults.” The study does not provide an immediate connection between the two but rather showcases an association. 

According to Oregon State University, “Evidence suggesting that some flavonoids or flavonoid-rich foods may enhance cognitive function is currently limited, and it is not yet known whether their consumption could lower the risk of cognitive impairments and dementia in humans.” The University also stated that certain flavonoids have been shown to, “cross the blood-brain barrier and exert preventive effects towards cognitive impairments in animal models of normal and pathological aging.” Not only helpful for cardiovascular health, flavonoids are being investigated for their effect on the body all over the world.

A 2019 piece published in Nature Communications also found that foods rich in flavonoids could decrease the risk of cancer. Flavonoid rich foods include apples, berries, cocoa-based products, red grapes, and red wine and tea.

Marijuana legalization is intrinsically tied to social justice.

However, Democratic presidential nominee Joe Biden has maintained his opposition to making cannabis legal. Some hope that could change as more people become aware of the impact that the War on Drugs has had on people of color.

Even as he enjoys an early lead in election polls, people within his own party hope Biden will change his stance. That includes people working on his campaign who have made their support of cannabis legalization public. But any cannabis entrepreneur or investor considering the odds of Biden changing his mind need to look at the full picture of political realities.

First and foremost is the primary vote itself. Despite the fact his opponents took much more progressive stances on marijuana, Biden won.

As Vox noted: “The issue, apparently, wasn’t a major priority for Democratic voters during the primary. Biden still walked away with the most delegates to become the presumptive nominee. With a coronavirus pandemic and recession still underway, perhaps Biden is hoping the same will hold up in the general election, too.”