Illinois Medical Marijuana Cards Top 3,000

[Jacob Redmond]

About 3,000 of some 3,700 people who have applied for cards allowing them to buy medical marijuana have been approved by the state of Illinois.

That's according to the Illinois Department of Public Health, which updates the figures on the first Wednesday of each month, the Belleville News-Democrat reports.

The number of residents applying and receiving the cards in Illinois grew slowly in August, as legal medical cannabis cultivation centers push to have the medicine in dispensaries by the state's fall deadline, the newspaper reports.

In the prior month's report, 3,500 had applied for the cards and 2,800 had received approval letters, seeing increases of 5.7 percent and 7.1 percent, respectively, in the new report, according to the newspaper.

Michael Mayes, a Chicago-based medical cannabis consultant and investor, told the News-Democrat that since the cards expire after only one year, patients have little incentive to get approval before the medicine becomes available. He predicted a surge in patient applications once the initial shipments of medicine arrives at the state's more than 50 licensed dispensaries.

News Moderator: Jacob Redmond 420 MAGAZINE ®
Full Article: Illinois medical marijuana cards top 3,000 - St. Louis Business Journal
Author: Diana Barr
Contact: Contact Us - St. Louis Business Journal
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Website: Business News - The Business Journals

 

[mlang52]

They have 3,500 patients out of, almost, 13,000,000 people in Illinois?! That is a joke! It is as much of a joke that they purport it to be a medical cannabis program! Fingerprinting people, before they are allowed treatment, occurs, as well. What do they think they are going to prove by getting fingerprints?! Do they think people with records will bother using the legal suppliers to get their medication? It is an insane way to treat non-criminals. Or, is it a way to create a database, and create more criminals?