By Erin Beck, The Register-Herald of Beckley
CHARLESTON, W.Va. – With bipartisan support, the West Virginia House of Delegates on Wednesday approved an amendment to a bill that would allow medical cannabis patients to use the dry leaf form of marijuana.
“Setting us up to have pill form only is setting us up for failure,” said Del. Brandon Steele, R- Raleigh.
West Virginia’s current medical marijuana law, passed in 2017 but yet to be implemented, requires patients to use one of the following forms of medical cannabis: pill, oil, topical forms, including gels, creams or ointments; a “form medically appropriate for administration by vaporization or nebulization, excluding dry leaf or plant form;” tincture; liquid; or dermal patch.
The House of Delegates Judiciary Committee had already approved, earlier this month, an amendment to a rules bundle permitting patients to use the plant form of marijuana. After lawmakers pass laws, state agencies then write rules describing how they will implement those laws, then those rules go back to state lawmakers for final approval.
Lawmakers in the committee earlier this month were considering Senate Bill 339, a bundle of rules submitted for legislative approval by the state Department of Health and Human Resources, including several relating to the state’s medical cannabis law. In that committee , Del. Brandon Steele, R-Raleigh, successfully moved to amend the rules bundle to allow patients to use the plant form of marijuana.
But Steele, as well as Del. Mike Pushkin, D- Kanawha and one of the leading proponents of medical marijuana in the Legislature, said legislative lawyers said that they needed to again approve the amendment on the floor Wednesday. …
