Quick Hit: what we've missed in recent weeks

As regular Newsweed consumers will have noticed, we've been on hiatus for the past few weeks. But since news doesn't wait for us, here's a recap of what's been happening in the meantime on Planet Cannabis.

France

While we were away, France legalized cannabis. Oops, no. In fact, it's come back to 1960 with a Ministry of the Interior communications campaign worthy of Nancy Reagan's «Say no to drugs», which claims to convince the convinced of the good work done by Place Beauvau. Visit Behind the Smoke« campaign», The «Behrière nos écrans de fumée» (Behind our smokescreens) campaign, devised by a Publicis lacking inspiration in what looks like a near-copy-and-paste of the name of the Netflix documentary, aims to blame school failure, domestic accidents and insecurity on cannabis. The undisclosed budget was probably insufficient to include global warming, the sinking of the Amoco Cadiz and Benjamin Griveaux's photo leak.

The ANSM has announced the creation of a temporary Scientific Committee on the cultivation of medical cannabis in France: «The opinion of this CST will focus on the THC and CBD content of plants and the variety of plants used. It will also have to define the traceability of plants up to the harvesting of flowers, the expected pharmaceutical forms of cannabis-based medicines, pharmaceutical quality criteria and the controls required for the cultivation of medical cannabis in France». Although the first meetings will take place in September 2021, the conclusions are already known, since European standards prevail and the model adopted will have to be close to the German model, which itself is based on the Canadian model, with EU-GMP standards added.

Aurora / Etypharm has delivered its first medical cannabis flowers in France in the form of 3 varieties:

• Aurora 20/1: LA Confidential variety
• Aurora 8/8: Equiposa variety
• Aurora 1/12: Cannatonic variety

The ANSM did not say how many patients had received these flowers.

However, DelleD, one of the most advanced French companies on the subject of medical cannabis (and one that we interviewed earlier) has secured funding from BPI France and the Ile-de-France region after raising 3 million euros in 2020. The company plans to launch its first clinical trial in 2022, which could easily exceed the number of patients included to date in the French trial.

National police cling to controlling CBD stores as if they were selling death. However, the new memo acknowledges that the numerous searches carried out since 2018 were undue in light of the Kanavape jurisprudence, French law and European law. Fortunately, stores will still be able to be prosecuted for incitement to the illicit use of narcotics, a conveniently vague offence.

➡️ Memo sheet #police/cab DGPN/pôle judiciaire sur le #CBD and regulations. pic.twitter.com/4BIq89KWIg

- Police Against Prohibition (@collectifPCP) July 30, 2021

ADVERTISING

Europe

The planets are aligning in Germany for the forthcoming legalization of cannabis. Erwin Rueddel, member of the Bundestag (CDU) and chairman of its health committee, in particular a legal cannabis experiment for adult use in #Allemagne «during the next legislative period». Germany's Commissioner for the Fight against Drugs also ensured want to relax legislation on cannabis possession, for example by allowing possession of less than 6 grams of cannabis throughout Germany.

Cookies, which will be soon to be legally distributed in Canada, has taken another step into Europe, thanks to a cultivation partnership with Flowr Corporation at their Portuguese site. European patients will soon have access to one of the world's most popular cannabis brands.

Switzerland continues its easier access to medical cannabis. It is now the Federal Council which validated the decision.

A Italian study reveals that oral CBD sprays are associated with improvements in patients suffering from refractory migraines.

The Dutch Ministry of Health has awarded a €1.4 million grant for research into the efficacy of medicinal cannabis in children suffering from treatment-resistant epilepsy. The research will try to find out whether medical cannabis reduces the frequency and/or severity of epileptic seizures in children.

British CBD brand Cannaray has launched an attractive advertising campaign set against a backdrop of revolution.

International

South Africa unveiled its legalization plan of cannabis. Estimated sales are in the region of €1.6 billion, and could create up to 25,000 jobs while attracting foreign investment.

Tilray has purchased part of MedMen's debt, which could be converted into equity the day the US legalizes cannabis.

Buzzfeed has launched its Goodful cannabis brand in partnership with Californian cannabis producer NUG. The site publisher realized that part of its audience was more than just interested in cannabis topics. Unfortunately for us, the company closed its French offices in 2018. So we avoided CBD Buzzfeed.

The US CBD market is expected to reach 2.8 billion $ per year by 2028, according to projections from Grand View Research.

Seth Rogen has decided to terminate its partnership with Canopy Growth for the distribution of Houseplant products in Canada. While Houseplant has become one of Canada's best-selling beverages, the quality of its flowers has left consumers wanting more than what is grown and smoked in the USA. However, Rogen plans to return to Canada as soon as he has found a grower capable of delivering quality on a par with that of the US.

Still Canada, legalization didn't bring any more of teenagers to use cannabis. The «what kind of example would we be setting for young people» argument, often trotted out in France by known drinkers, seems surprisingly false.