In a recent move to decriminalize cannabis in Virginia, lawmakers have introduced new rules that will take effect on July 1st of this year. With the new changes it means that there will be reduced penalties for personal possession, up to an ounce of cannabis. Those reduced penalties might come with a small fine but include no arrest or criminal record.
Right now there is a medicinal cannabis program in Virginia and it offers cannabis products to those who have been approved. But of course those products must pass through a maze of regulations first before being sold.
In 2019, less than 2 percent of licensed doctors in Virginia had registered to write those medical cannabis recommendations.
That means that there are very few yet who are willing to get involved, helping people to join up to the medicinal cannabis program, and it still might be incredibly difficult for people in that region to pursue cannabis freedom for themselves.
Those who are approved have had to receive a certificate from a doctor that approves the use of THC-A and CBD products for personal consumption.
Lawmakers in Virginia might one day join the wave of legalization around the country and pursue more recreational cannabis privileges, but that wasn't the recent change they sought to make just yet. In the meantime, reducing criminal penalties that are associated with cannabis activity is a good thing because those activities never should have been criminalized in the first place to the extent that they have. Criminal justice resources shouldn't be wasted to the extent that they are on drug war policies any longer, there are more important activities to be concerned with.
According to the current attorney general in Virginia, M. Herring, he says that this decriminalization move that they've recently made is just one step on their path to eventually realize further legalization of cannabis for regulated adult legal market. As it stands right now, there still seems to be plenty of confusion surrounding their medicinal cannabis program though, and by last year less than 1,000 people in the state had been registered with it altogether.