The New York medical cannabis program, which first welcomed patients in January, has gotten off to an extremely slow start, yet the state is contemplating expanding the number of licensed companies growing and distributing products, potentially adding five new licensees within the next two years. One of the five initial licensees, Bloomfield Industries, is rumored to face severe financial challenges, while the other four, which include Columbia Care, Etain, PharmaCann and Vireo Health, are experiencing low patient counts.
Right now, the issue with the New York medical cannabis program is entirely a matter of demand, and not capacity. The five current registered organizations are all operating somewhere south of about 10 percent of their existing capacity.
Jeremy Unruh, PharmaCann General Counsel
The program has fewer than 9000 patients that have registered cumulatively and only about 700 doctors (less than 1% of the state’s physicians) who are able to provide recommendations to patients. The program is extremely restrictive, with dosing limited exclusively to oils for vaporization or ingestion and very few qualifying conditions.
The right thing to do is to give the companies that are already here a chance to become economically feasible.
Ari Hoffnung, CEO of Vireo New York
Read James Walsh’s “State plans to expand struggling medical pot program”: http://www.recordonline.com/news/20161022/state-plans-to-expand-struggling-medical-pot-program
