Recently, the therapeutic properties of cannabis have been recognized, and this has led to the opening of new legal and scientific avenues, especially in Latin American countries mainly, although its recreational use is still considered illegal.
As we well know, it has taken a long time to put this issue on the table, but as a result of the decision of the World Health Organization to recognize the therapeutic properties of cannabis and withdrawing it from list IV of the 1961 Convention on drugs, a possible future has been opened to Latin American producers
With this decision, the UN closes a 60-year denial of what has been documented as one of the oldest medicinal plants that humanity has domesticated, ”the Franco-Algerian researcher said from Barcelona on the day of the vote.
While in almost all America advances cannabis regulationIn Paraguay, the largest producer on the continent together with Mexico, paradoxically it is still a taboo, and this rectification of the UN may cause an advance at the legislative level in these producing countries (Paraguay and Mexico)
Photo by Andrej Lišakov on Unsplash
Mexico is the main producer of marijuana in North America, between 50% and 80% of the cannabis that is smuggled into the US comes from there
This change in criteria may cause the plant to be considered as prohibited substances under the General Health Law in Mexico, and the law on recreational, medical, scientific and industrial consumption may be endorsed.
We can say that This news is of greatest benefit to countries where drug laws are more conservative (especially in producing countries) since it can influence from the legal to the economic level. For example, in Spain, despite not being one of the most restrictive countries, it could be one of the world’s largest producers thanks to the climate if there were a comprehensive regulation of cannabis like the one Mexico claims. Other more restrictive countries such as Paraguay, the law speaks of penalties of up to 20 years of pressure for possession, cultivation or consumption
And speaking of research
Cannabis is used in healthcare systems in the United States (1996), Canada (1999), Israel (2001), the Netherlands (2003), Switzerland (2011), the Czech Republic (2013), Australia (2016) and Germany (2017) and the majority of the EU for resistant epilepsy, fibromyalgia, arthritis, asthma and glaucoma, and for accompanying chemotherapy, autism or anxiety, among others, according to the European Observatory for Drugs. This change of opinion is only the beginning of a future in which cannabis will be freed from the burden to be able to investigate about it. even in diseases as current as Covid-19
Photo by Enecta Cannabis extracts on Unsplash
In the case of the US, the cannabis industry is growing, having registered more than 19,000 million dollars in 2020, it is expected to be 45,000 million dollars by 2025. Not to say that 1040 million dollars were collected only in taxes, taxes that could be used to further investigate the therapeutic properties demonstrated in many cases.
Let’s hope that little by little the taboo around marijuana will be dismantled and sooner or later we can see a comprehensive regulation in all areas.
Source: The Country
