Czech parliament moves forward on medical cannabis liberalization

On Wednesday June 2, the lower house of the Czech Parliament approved draft amendments to the laws governing the production and prescription of medical cannabis and hemp.

The main changes are as follows:

• Medical cannabis can be cultivated by various private groups, which can also manufacture medical cannabis products.
• The export of medical cannabis will now be explicitly legal
• The marketing of extracts such as isolates and oils will be authorized.
• Cannabis e-prescription system to be updated to facilitate process for doctors and patients
• Hemp products containing less than 1 % THC will not be considered as addictive substances, This paves the way for the cultivation and production of products with these concentrations.

The Senate and the Czech President will now have to examine the bill before it is officially accepted. Supporters of the changes are confident that the amendments will pass after the Assembly has given its approval.

For Pavel Kubu, CEO of the International Cannabis and Cannabinoid Institute, «Parliament's approval of the bill is an important step for patients and medical cannabis advocates in the Czech Republic. We must remain realistic about the amount of work that remains to be done. This bill could do a lot to advance medical cannabis and hemp in the country, but much of that relies on implementation of the laws, and groups like ICCI will be working hard with the government over the coming months to ensure that the interests of patients and the industry are honored.»

Hana Gabrielová, CEO of Hemp Point and President of Hemp Cluster, the non-profit collective that defends hemp in the Czech Republic, explains that «this is a great victory for advocates of medical cannabis and hemp in the country, especially considering the unanimous support for the bill from all political parties. The new regulations on THC concentrations in hemp are welcome, but again, there's still a lot of work to be done. With our general election coming up in the autumn, we'll need to work hard and alongside the government to ensure that the new regulations are implemented to best effect, many of these details still need to be ironed out.»

The Czech Republic charts its own course

The Czech Republic is a pioneer in the regulation of substances such as cannabis, particularly in terms of risk reduction and patient access.

Under laws in force since 2010, the possession or use of personal quantities of drugs of any kind is not a criminal offence. Medical cannabis has been legally available in the Czech Republic since 2013. However, access to legally prescribed products didn't gain traction until 2018, and has grown exponentially since then. This has been helped by recent legislation in force since 2020, This means that 90% of the cost of medical cannabis must be covered by insurance agencies for quantities of up to 30g per month.

The growth seen in recent years has continued to the present day and is likely to continue for some years to come. In the first four months of 2021, more than 2,419 patients were prescribed 31.6 kilograms of medical cannabis, more than double the amount for the same period in 2020.

Patient access remains limited

Despite the considerable progress made in recent years in terms of access to medical cannabis, the quantity of patients with access to legally prescribed products remains extremely low. The Czech Republic has a population of around 10.65 million, of whom around 3,500, or 0.04 %, obtained medical cannabis legally in 2020. By comparison, Michigan in the USA, with a slightly smaller population than the Czech Republic, has 250,000 active patients, or 2.5 % of the population. In Germany, we estimate that around 0.1% of adults access medical cannabis each year, twice the frequency of Czechoslovakia.

One of the main problems holding back the growth of patient access in the Czech Republic is that regulations have prevented the cultivation of medical cannabis and the marketing of products outside a strictly controlled tendering process and a limited system of imports.

To date, the only domestic medical cannabis supplied to Czech patients comes from the only state-contracted producer, Elkoplast Slušovice s.r.o., via the only state-contracted distributor, Alliance Healthcare s.r.o.. Under the new legislation, licenses to grow and manufacture medical cannabis products will be open to private groups, which should increase the availability and diversity of products and lower the final price for patients.

Pavel Kubu predicts that the number of new licenses issued will largely depend on how the new law is implemented and who oversees its implementation, as determined by the forthcoming elections.

In addition, updating the medical cannabis prescription system will mean that doctors should be more willing to start prescriptions, as the bureaucratic burden associated with these prescriptions has been improved.

With the liberalization of medical cannabis in the Czech Republic, opportunities are opening up to produce cannabis on the market and export it to the European market. Patient access is expected to continue for several years before the market reaches full maturity.