New Jersey’s Cannabis Regulatory Commission (CRC) is calling for public comments on proposals that would expand access to medical cannabis patients and allow “clinically focused” dispensaries to enter partnerships with research institutions to carry out studies on cannabis using the products that are grown or sold to the patients.
The CRC aims to amend the current cannabis law to create new “clinical registrant permits” that would allow clinical registrant dispensaries to cultivate, manufacture, and dispense medical cannabis like traditional dispensary licensees, but also enter “written contractual relationship with an academic medical center in the region in which it has its principal place of business” in order to “engage in clinical research related to the use of medical cannabis.”
“A clinical registrant may dispense usable medical cannabis and medical cannabis products, in any form authorized by an institutional review board (IRB), directly to an academic medical center as part of a research study,” the proposed rule states. “An academic medical center that handles medical cannabis items shall do so in a manner consistent with the academic medical center’s standards used for the handling, storage, and disposal of other patient medications.”
Clinical registrant dispensaries can not concurrently “hold a non-clinical medical cannabis cultivator, medical cannabis manufacturer, or medical cannabis dispensary permit or a personal-use cannabis business license” and academic institutions are not allowed to accept anything from the dispensaries other than “reasonable remuneration, specifically in a research contract for the services to be performed or costs to be incurred by the academic medical center.”
The types of research that will be conducted include the therapeutic or palliative efficacy of medical cannabis. The CRC believes the proposed new rules will also have an economic benefit for residents in the state and could help researchers by allowing a wider access to cannabis products to study as federal prohibition only allows cannabis produced by the DEA to be used for research purposes. Public comments on the proposal are being accepted until October 6. The CRC has opened to public comments on previous proposals as well, including on proposed amendments that would provide changes to licensing processes for delivery, distribution, and wholesale operations
“The Commission expects that the proposed new rules on clinical registrant permits would have the beneficial social impact of fully achieving the statutory objective of ensuring safe access to medical cannabis for those patients in need by authorizing an additional permit type,” the CRC said.
The CRC recently proposed new regulations that would allow for an expanded selection of cannabis edibles for both the medical and adult-use markets, rolling back on rules that initially banned the sale of cannabis edibles that resembled food products and only approving the sale of non-perishable cannabis edibles like lozenges and gummies. Under the proposed regulations, all products must contain clearly displayed warning labels and be packaged in child-resistant packaging that doesn’t have any imagery or names that could attract the attention of children. Edibles will be capped at 10 milligrams of THC per serving and beverages will be limited to 5mg per serving.
The proposal was approved 4-0 by the board and is subject to a 60-day public comment period from Oct. 16 through Dec. 15. Finalization of the rules may take up to six months so until then, licensed producers in the state are able to apply for a waiver to allow them to produce and sell some edibles.
“Overall, I believe that this will help New Jersey’s market move further toward a more mature cannabis market. It will really expand product offerings akin to what you see in markets that might be at this for five or 10 years,” said CRC Executive Director Jeff Brown. “I think there’s been excitement from the industry.”
