Pa.’s medical marijuana industry nearly tripled in 2019

Pennsylvania’s medical marijuana industry has made $350 million in sales since the state’s first dispensary opened in February 2018, nearly tripling in five months.

John Collins, director of the Pennsylvania Office of Medical Marijuana gave an update on the progress of the state’s program to the Pennsylvania Medical Marijuana Advisory board Wednesday.

Two hundred million dollars’ worth of 4.4 million medical marijuana products were sold to the state’s 200,000 individuals registered to purchase the products, according to Collins. The medical marijuana industry’s total revenue also puts into account $150 million in sales between the state’s growers and processors of medical marijuana to dispensaries.

The last update given on the state’s revenue was on February 2018 after dispensaries began selling the product and in that time total medical marijuana sales grossed at $132 million including sales from dispensaries and growers and processors.

Likewise, the number of registrants have jumped from 116,000 to 200,000. The growth has been attributed to the continued rise in the state’s number of active dispensaries, which have gone from 45 to 60, and a rise in growers and processors from 12 to 18.

On July 20, the state Department of Health approved anxiety disorders and Tourette syndrome to be added to the list of conditions eligible for medical marijuana treatment. Since then, the rate of patients certified to use medical marijuana to treat their anxiety disorders has been particularly fast, growing by a thousand people a week, according to Collins.

“That growth rate makes it fairly comparable with how severe chronic pain rolled out initially,” Collins said, referencing the largest condition treated with medical marijuana in the state with about 50 percent of registrants in the state.

At the end of June, the state also approved a partnership between Penn State College of Medicine and Harrisburg-based grower, processer and dispensary, PA Options for Wellness. PA Options for Wellness was one of three companies to be approved as a clinical registrant for Pennsylvania’s medical marijuana research program after the first wave of applications didn’t meet the state’s standards.

The other two registrants included: Agronomed Biologics LLC, affiliated with Drexel University of Medicine in Philadelphia; and MLH Explorations LLC, affiliated with Sidney Kimmel Medical College at Thomas Jefferson University in Philadelphia.

During Wednesday’s meeting, Secretary of Health Dr. Rachel Levine said that the state Department of Health is hopeful that a third wave of applications set to begin this fall will be more fruitful and allow for all eight centers to begin research.

“Round three will open up sometime this fall for clinical registrants,” Levine said. “We are cautiously optimistic that these clinical registrants will be approved to work with the five other academic clinical research centers.”

The five other centers include Lake Erie College of Osteopathic Medicine in Erie, University of Pittsburgh School of Medicine in Pittsburgh and Lewis Katz School of Medicine at Temple University, The Perelman School of Medicine at the University of Pennsylvania and Philadelphia College of Osteopathic Medicine in Philadelphia.