Medical Cannabis Clinic opens in London
European Cannabis Holdings has opened the second of its Medical Cannabis Clinics in Britain, this time in London on Harley Street. The first was in Birmingham.
The London clinic will not have a paediatric department at the outset. Appointments cost £200 and prescriptions will cost £600 to £700 a month. A GP will assess patients and can refer them to an on-site specialist with the power to approve a prescription.
Clinical director Professor Mike Barnes told us last week that prescriptions will presently take 8 weeks to arrive as they are imported. In the same time you could grow a short flowering indica cannabis plant (good for pain and sleep issues) – and it would only cost you £300, including the equipment.
Italy gives firms two weeks to bid for medical cannabis tender
The Italian Ministry of Defence (MOD), which has the sole licence to grow cannabis domestically and controls the country’s production, is inviting bids from firms until 3 July to supply 400kg of medical cannabis every four months over the next two years.
The product requested is dried cannabis flower, whole or milled, in three lots: 320kg of high THC content, 40kg of a CBD/THC split product, and 40kg of high CBD content.
The successful applicant will help to not only address Italy’s growing demand for medical cannabis but also to diversify away from Bedrocan, which supplied around 450kg in 2018 (around two-thirds of Italy’s supply).
The MOD’s target price on the contract is set at €3 or €4 per gram depending on the strain. However, in line with the previous tender won in 2017 by Aurora/Pedanios, bids are expected to come in below this threshold.
The short deadline “is causing discontent in the market”, an industry figure told Prohibition Partners.
Medical cannabis prescriptions quadruple in Czech Republic
4,800 grams of medical cannabis were issued in Czech Republic in 2018, four times as much as the year before.
The figure in 2019 is already higher at 5,347 grams, issued to 665 patients. Nearly 90% of the total amount is being prescribed to treat chronic intractable pain, followed by multiple sclerosis.
Cannabis treatment in the Czech Republic will be largely financed through public health insurance by next year. The Ministry of Health has proposed a 90% reimbursement from public health insurance on 30 grams of medical cannabis for one patient one month.
Global cannabis economy to hit £15bn this year
The global cannabis market could be worth $14.9bn in 2019, according to “The State of Legal Cannabis Markets” report by Arcview. The total would be up 36% on 2018.
The report assessed the “total cannabinoid market”, meaning it included sales of medical and recreational cannabis at dispensaries; hemp-derived products rich in non-psychoactive cannabidiol, or CBD; and US Food & Drug Administration approved CBD-based pharmaceuticals.
Comments (3)