Could recreational marijuana hurt the medical marijuana community? A new report from GreenWave Advisors believes that legalized retail marijuana will disrupt the emerging medical sector.
In states where recreational marijuana has been legalized, medical marijuana patient counts have dropped. It was long suspected that many people who just wanted to smoke pot claimed a medical condition such as chronic pain in order to legally buy and use marijuana. Chronic pain is the most common qualifying condition and this is the group that drops in patient counts when retail marijuana becomes available
The analysts’ report notes that patient counts decelerated in Colorado, Oregon and Washington D.C. Washington state doesn’t count patients and Alaska patients can grow their plants at home making it harder to count. GreenWave wrote, “Though Arizona permits only medicinal use, new cardholder applications were down sharply (73%) in May, perhaps in anticipation of a favorable election outcome for recreational use.” [Read more at Forbes]