Puerto Rico Announces It’s Starting a Medical Marijuana Program

Puerto Ricans will soon be able to use medical marijuana products for chronic, terminal and debilitating qualifying conditions.

The U.S. Territory will offer creams, tinctures, patches and pills for qualifying medical marijuana patients. Provisions for cultivating, manufacturing and distributing of medical marijuana products has been approved for medical use only, and recreational marijuana use remains illegal.

The Public Affairs Secretary, Jesus Manuel Ortiz, states that the program should be in place by the end of 2016, according to ABC News.

The program will be very regulated, and will track medical marijuana from seed to sale. Private companies will be permitted to obtain licenses to cultivate the medicine. Puerto Rico’s program will also require lab testing to ensure that marijuana is free of contaminants. Testing completed at independent labs will also help determine that each strain grown has the proper amounts of THC as regulated by the program.