Gov. Rick Scott signed a bill Friday to expand Florida’s “Right To Try” compassionate use registry to allow terminally ill patients to use medical marijuana.
The bill, which was one of the most hotly-debated pieces of legislation during this year’s regular session in Tallahassee, overwhelmingly won the approval of state lawmakers earlier this month.
The bill, HB 307, would create new regulations for medical marijuana use in the Sunshine State. Floridians who have less than a year to live would be able to use certain non-smokable forms of medical marijuana.
Only physicians can put patients on the compassionate use registry. Physicians would have to participate in an 8-hour course and an exam offered by the Florida Medical Association or the Florida Osteopathic Medical Association that teaches physicians the clinical indications for the appropriate use of medical cannabis.
Any patient under the age of 18 would need a second opinion from another physician to determine whether medical marijuana was right for them.
The course would also cover “appropriate” cannabis delivery mechanisms as well as the federal laws about medical marijuana. The exam would be administered at least annually, according to the proposal.
The legislation would also provide for five dispensing operations to make medical marijuana accessible to patients. The five dispensaries would be located in Florida’s five different regions: northwest Florida, northeast Florida, central Florida, southeast Florida and southwest Florida.
Dispensaries would have to show they had the technology and technical ability to produce medical cannabis. They’d also have to have a valid certificate from the Florida Department of Agriculture, which would allow them to cultivate over 400,000 plants.
Rep. Katie Edwards, D-Plantation, praised the governor for his signature of the new bill.
“I’m optimistic we’re going to see progress now, with the very real opportunity for more patients to find relief now that this bill has become law,” Edwards said. “People facing a terminal prognosis deserve all options to ease suffering and improve their quality of life. That’s why we passed the Right to Try Act last year, and that’s why adding medical marijuana to the options available to doctors and patients is the right thing to do.”
Edwards was a key figure in the passage in 2014 of the Compassionate Medical Cannabis Act, which allowed cannabis with very low psychoactive properties to be prescribed to patients with conditions such as epilepsy known to respond to a specific, non-intoxicating element of marijuana.
The Right to Try Act in 2015 made drugs awaiting final regulatory approval available under very limited circumstances to terminal patients.
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