Berkeley, California orders free pot for poor patients

[slimvictor]

BERKELEY California (Reuters) - A California college town known for its liberal activism has voted to make medicinal marijuana dispensaries give away free a small amount of their pot to the poor.

Berkeley City Council members voted unanimously late on Tuesday to instruct local outlets to provide marijuana equal to 2 percent of their sales to patients on low incomes.

"It's an equity issue," Council member Darryl Moore told Reuters. "We want to ensure that those who are in need have access to the medication necessary to treat their condition."

Under the law, which takes effect next month, the marijuana given away free must be of the same quality as that given to paying customers.

The rule defines low income as medical marijuana patients who make at most half the area's median annual income, or $32,000 or less for an individual or $46,000 for a family of four.

cont at
http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/sns-rt-us-usa-marijuana-berkeley-20140709,0,2789398.story

 

[weekend addiction]

I for one think that drugs should be expensive (including life-saving medicine) as a way to stimulate the economy. Survival of the fittest.

 

[...]

Anybody who makes less than six figures in Berkeley is poor. Cost of living is through the stratosphere.

 

[CLICKHEREx]

This is exactly what so-called compassionate countries such as Australia, Great Britain, and New Zealand should be doing; providing free, or very low cost medicinal cannabis to the financially disadvantaged, subsidised by those who can afford to pay the full cost, at the very least, for people suffering from seizures, those on chemotherapy, and long term, heavy users of opiod medications for extreme pain, because its mortality rate is virtually zero, and addiction potential is less than that of opiods, and if it's addictive, but you need it, you can still get the benefits, without major risks, as is currently the case with the thousands of opiod users dying annually, while lining the pockets of the pharmaceutical companies.