Spain's Cannabis Cultivation Authorization: Patients Left Behind?

By Lucia Tedesco Via El Planteo

Last year, an opinion was approved to implement the regulation of medicinal cannabis in Spain. The European country had 6 months to carry out the process, and it has already expired. Meanwhile, cultivation permits continue to be granted to companies (for now, 21), whose production is used solely for research.

But as cannabis is not legal in Spain, all the advances that companies have in the weed field will be destined for patients from other countries. The Spanish Agency for Medicines and Products (Aemps) has not yet realized the necessary report to implement the regulation.

Carola Pérez, president of the Spanish Observatory for Medicinal Cannabis, said during an interview with The Objective: "At the end, everything they prepare and investigate will end up going to the rest of Europe and Spanish patients will not receive it."

What worries Pérez and the rest of the cannabis community in Spain is that the project would be forgotten. The country entered an electoral year, and there is the possibility that a change of government will be drawn, so legalization could continue to be delayed. It seems that chronic pain patients would not be first on the agenda.

Moreover, it is uncertain how this regularization would be carried out; that is, under what guidelines. "Nobody knows how to tell us what happens next," said Pérez.

The deadline to communicate the report expired on December 27, and already in 2023 concerns and doubts are growing, especially among those who need medical cannabis for their treatments. It's okay to have to be patient, but how much longer will they have to wait?

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