One of the more dicey prospects in states with legal medical cannabis is preventing the proliferation of card mills. If you are not sure what card mills are and why it matters, you are about to find out. Preventing card mill proliferation is a top priority for state lawmakers and regulators.
The card mill issue is directly related to how medical cannabis patients access their medicines. In Utah, the concern about card mill proliferation was serious enough that state lawmakers decided to limit the number of patients a medical provider could treat via cannabis recommendation. They have since relaxed the rules now that their program is well established and the threat of card mills has seemingly passed.
Nobody Gets a Prescription
This entire discussion begins with the understanding that nobody gets a medical cannabis prescription. Doctors cannot write cannabis prescriptions under current law. So how do patients access medical cannabis? Through a state-issued medical cannabis card. Let us use Utah as an example once again.
The operators of the Utahmarijuana.org website explain that the state issues several different types of Medical Cannabis Cards. The most common card is simply known as the patient card. It is issued to legal adults with a qualifying condition and a recommendation from a medical provider.
A card gives a patient access to any one of Utah’s 15 medical cannabis pharmacies. Only card-carrying patients can purchase medical cannabis products at a pharmacy. Not only that, but pharmacies are also the only legal outlets for cannabis in the state.
The Card Mill Proposition
When Utah lawmakers were first tasked with turning a successful voter proposition into a viable medical cannabis law, they were worried that clinics would start popping up all over the state, clinics that did nothing more than perform a cursory physical exam before signing off on a patient’s medical cannabis card application. They would charge an exorbitant fee to rubber stamp the application.
To keep that from happening, lawmakers required that medical providers become state-licensed Qualified Medical Providers (QMPs) before they could recommend medical cannabis. They went further to impose a 600-patient limit on each provider. In so doing, they took away the financial incentive to operate a card mill. Any medical provider hoping to help medical cannabis patients obtain their cards also needs to carry on a legitimate practice to make ends meet.
In my opinion, lawmakers’ concerns were legitimate. Remember that Utah does not allow recreational marijuana. So without controls in place, it’s not unthinkable that unscrupulous business owners would open storefronts that were medical clinics in name only. They could start passing out marijuana recommendations like candy, giving legal permission to anyone who wanted to use marijuana recreationally.
Keeping a Lid on Things
When you look into the details of why Utah lawmakers structured their law the way they did, you see that their intentions were noble. They worked extremely hard to keep a lid on things. By and large, they have succeeded. The Utahmarijuana.org people say that the Beehive State’s medical cannabis program is among the best in the country. The largely rural state now boasts more than 83,000 cardholders and a robust market capable of meeting most patients’ needs.
Had lawmakers not put rules in place to prevent card mills, who knows what Utah’s program would look like? I am willing to bet it would not be nearly as controlled as it is today. To me, lawmakers did the right thing. As long as medical cannabis is going to be allowed, it should be controlled just as tightly as any other prescription medication.
