Utah’s cannabis program causes bleeding in patients, but this month’s legislative changes will remove one costly hurdle.
(Francisco Chorces | Salt Lake Tribune) Robert Geerke.
A small tweak to Utah’s medical marijuana program, which went into effect earlier this month, could make a big difference to patients and a system that is rapidly losing customers.
Until this month, cannabis patients had to pay an upfront fee and renew their medical cannabis card every six months. Utah is the only state in the nation with such frequent requirements.
The fee the state charged was only $15, so no big deal, right?
The problem was that by law patients were also required to see a health care provider, and that visit was far from cheap. The first visit costs an average of $200, up to $350, and subsequent follow-up visits average $128, up to $250.
That means, on average, it will cost you $328 and up to $600 before you spend a dime on medicine.
If you buy a lot, it might be a price you’ll be happy to pay. But if you’re a patient who uses cannabis infrequently, and you spend $30 or $50 a month, say, when the pain gets worse, your annual fee is basically double the price of the drug. .
At that point, you might say, ‘Oh no,’ put that money in a tank of gas and drive to Wendover, but that defeats the very purpose of Utah’s medical cannabis program in the first place. It will end up.
“Juice isn’t worth squeezing,” Chris Jeffery, co-founder and CEO of Wholesome, one of Utah’s medical cannabis dispensaries, explained to me. “That’s not what we want as a nation.”
Unsurprisingly, Utah’s medical cannabis program has a significantly higher churn rate. Between July of last year and April of this year, nearly 2,550 people in Utah received medical marijuana cards each month. During the same period, 1,830 people dropped out of the program each month after their cards expired.
Your program is still growing, says Jeffrey, but it doesn’t stay on track when nearly 7 out of 10 patients drop out. As you can imagine, sales are particularly high for people who don’t buy a lot of products. “It’s like a factory that stirs and burns,” he said.
So, in the last Congress, Senator Luz Escamilla sponsored SB137 and changed Utah’s renewal requirement from every six months to every year, among other things. The law, which went into effect on May 3, allows health care providers to ask patients to come in for tests more frequently, but it’s a doctor-patient conversation, but state requirements are annual. is an update.
“I don’t think it’s in the legislative branch’s power to set arbitrary schedules without any evidence,” he told Congress.
While that should be a boost for cannabis programs, it will also benefit patients.
Christine Stenquist, founder and chairman of the patient advocacy group Together for Responsible Youth and Cannabis Education (TRUCE), said: I’ve been advocating and promoting this for years, so I’m happy to see it come to fruition.” “It’s a step in the right direction.”
It’s like the story of the entire cannabis program in Utah. Congress reluctantly accepted the public’s desire for a medical cannabis program, but created an overly regulated, overly complicated and patient-challenging system.
But every year since its inception there has been a step in the right direction, moving the state towards something that is hopefully sustainable and works for the people it should support.