A Michigan judge has once again halted the state’s self-imposed deadline to issue licenses to medical marijuana businesses. The Oct. 31 deadline, now lifted, was expected to force more than 200 dispensaries to close across the state.

The state had complied with a similar court order, which extended a Sept. 15 deadline.

Court of Claims Judge Stephen Borello’s temporary restraining order this week will allow those businesses to continue operating for the time being, even without a formal license to do so. The judge called the Oct. 31 licensing deadline “arbitrary and capricious.”

Borello will provide an update to the case on Nov. 9. The lead plaintiff is First Class Inc., a Lansing-based business with local approval for a processing facility (but no state approval yet). “These facilities will be forced to close their doors without any good reason, and they face the very real risk that they will not be able to reopen at all, even if their applications are approved by [the Michigan Department of Licensing and Regulatory Affairs (LARA)] at some point in the future,” the business stated via its lawsuit against the state of Michigan.

LARA’s medical marijuana licensing board will meet Nov. 8, and some license approvals are expected. Hundreds of applications, all told, from every category of cannabis business, await word from LARA. So far, 64 medical marijuana licenses, including 37 dispensaries, have been approved by the state since the application deadline of Feb. 15. The state initially received 804 applications.

Top photo courtesy of Adobe Stock

BERKELEY, Calif., Oct. 30, 2018 /PRNewswire/ -- PRESS RELEASE -- After serving Oahu's patients for over a year, Steep Hill Hawaii, Hawaii's first cannabis testing lab to be State of Hawaii Department of Health (HDOH) and International Organization for Standardization (ISO/IEC 17025:2005) certified, is expanding to the Big Island.

Dana Ciccone, owner and CEO of Steep Hill Hawaii, announced the opening of Steep Hill Hawaii's second location. "We are thrilled to open up our new location in Kailua Kona, Hawaii. We have been working closely with the Department of Health and we look forward to working together with the large patient population and the two new dispensaries opening very soon. Our focus continues to be quick turnaround, good service, and competitive prices," Ciccone said.

Dr. Andrew Rosenstein, CEO of Steep Hill, said, "In extending its services, Steep Hill Hawaii is committed to providing safe medicine and high quality testing to Hawaii's patient community. Dana and the Steep Hill Hawaii team have worked hard to open up this new location and will continue to support cultivators and dispensaries in this emerging market."

AMSTERDAM, October 31, 2018 - PRESS RELEASE - With the current exponential growth of both the global cannabis industry and blockchain technology, there is a potential partnership that stands to benefit both. Within the cannabis industry, there is a growing demand for payment solutions, track and traceability of crops, and trust mechanisms. BitCanna is addressing each of these problems through the launch of its blockchain platform and associated cryptocurrency. Over the past year, a team of 20 dedicated specialists has worked in close collaboration with the cannabis industry on the development of the platform and its global expansion. A large and growing number of leading international brands have already confirmed their partnership, and on the first of November their ICO will open for interested investors.

Most banks and financial service providers still refuse to process cannabis transactions due to the large degree of regulatory uncertainty in the industry. Leading experts and entrepreneurs from both the financial and cannabis industries view this as a huge opportunity to build a global digital payment solution for cannabis retailers that can circumvent traditional financial institutions. 

“Keeping up with constantly changing cannabis laws is very difficult. So banks, credit card companies and online payment providers either refuse to get involved in cannabis, or they charge excessively high transaction fees,” according to Jan Scheele, CEO of BitCanna. “That puts companies who are selling cannabis products legally in a tricky situation—they have to figure out how to take their businesses cashless and sell online without breaking any laws. That’s where BitCanna will help.”

BitCanna is a global blockchain technology company that helps cannabis companies to go cashless securely, legally and cost-effectively. The company claims to be able to process transactions using its BitCanna token almost instantaneously and for a fee of just a few cents. It will also let vendors manage their supply chains and record all customer identification data.

“It doesn’t matter if it’s a $10 or $100 transaction. Our customers will pay a small flat fee,” says Scheele. “We’re introducing a payment system that will make it cost-effective and safe for all cannabis companies to accept digital payments—whether they’re selling online or in-store.”

It’s not just online retailers who can benefit from blockchain technology. Some brick and mortar cannabis retailers spend as much as 10 to 15 percent of their revenues on security and staff to upkeep a cash-only business. Providing these companies with payment processing technology can help them reduce security risks while complying with regulations.

Many industry experts believe that despite the growth we’ve seen over the past few years, the cannabis market is only just beginning to take shape. In the United States alone, the cannabis market is forecast to double from $22B in 2017 to $44B in 2020. And the global market is expected to reach $140B by 2027, according to European investment bank Bryan, Garnier & Co.

BitCanna will have direct integration with some of the largest online cannabis shops when it launches in Q3 2019. It will run pilots at brick and mortar locations in the cannabis capitals Amsterdam and Barcelona. BitCanna alone has already partnered with dozens of cannabis companies to create the BitCanna Alliance. Alliance members are active in 27 countries and attract a combined 10 million unique website visitors a month so far.

NEW YORK, Oct. 31, 2018 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- PRESS RELEASE -- The Columbia University Department of Psychiatry and Columbia Care LLC, a medical cannabis company, have announced that researchers from Columbia University have been awarded an R21 research grant from the National Institute on Drug Abuse (NIDA) to study, in collaboration with Columbia Care, the potential mechanisms of how using Columbia Care’s formulated dose-metered cannabinoid medicines influences opioid use and overdose risk among patients with non-cancer pain conditions.

The research will be led by Dr. Arthur Robin Williams, MD, MBE, assistant professor in the Division on Substance Use Disorders in the Columbia University Department of Psychiatry. The study will expand upon pilot data collected by Columbia Care, an entity independent from Columbia University, which examined opioid use in 76 neuropathy patients across a wide range of indications, but without an additional cancer diagnosis, between the ages of 18 and 80 years old in New York State who were administered Columbia Care’s dose-metered cannabinoid medicines. The pilot study showed that 62 percent of the neuropathy patients decreased or stopped their opioid use while taking Columbia Care’s medical cannabis consistently over a nine-month period. 

Dr. Williams commented, “There is an urgent need to investigate the potential impact of cannabinoid use on limiting opioid overdose risk and to determine whether specific products are more beneficial for certain populations of patients with pain and opioid use.”

Rosemary Mazanet, MD, PhD, chief science officer and chair of the scientific advisory board at Columbia Care added, “We are honored to have garnered the trust of both Columbia University and NIDA through our powerful pilot research using Columbia Care’s dose-metered, precision-manufactured medical cannabis products and are looking forward to expanding upon these results with Dr. Williams and his team in this first-of-its-kind collaboration. As the leading medical cannabis provider in both New York State and the nation, and the only medical cannabis company with the capabilities and high-quality products to allow for such a rigorous analysis, we have seen through this pilot study the power of our proprietary formulations to reduce our patients’ dependence on opioids in a defensible, scientific manner. With these pilot data, we are cautiously optimistic, hopeful and proud to bring the medical community one step closer to addressing one of the worst epidemics in our country’s history. Our hope is that this work can guide the design of treatment programs using our proprietary medicines and inform the development of future products to ultimately help the millions of American families currently suffering due to the opioid crisis.”