Image source: upi.com
Cannabis has been ignored, shamed and kicked to the curb for decades now, but it’s perhaps safe to say that the herb is finally seeing some light at the end of the tunnel. Many countries like Israel – one of the first few countries that encouraged research on medical cannabis – have adopted a brave stance and legalized cannabis even amidst a lot of confusion. Uruguay has joined the movement and you can now see pharmacies selling medical cannabis to its consumers!
Just about anybody who registers his name can buy cannabis without any problems in Uruguay. Currently, the government has 5000 users registered, and each of them can purchase about 5 grams costing $6.50 each. Uruguay is not new to the cannabis industry. In fact, this small country was the first in the world to pass a law legalizing the sale, recreational use and cultivation of cannabis.
Image source: independent.co.ug
The movement began in 2013 and Uruguay has certainly come a long way since then. But, it had many hurdles to cross before achieving anything. Uruguay was in the spotlight after Alicia Castilla – a 66-year-old woman who became famous for her book Cultura Cannabis – was jailed for growing cannabis plants at home.
After her arrest, the entire country was in shock. Known as The Reefer Grandmother, Alicia gained a lot of recognition and officials began to approach her to talk about cannabis and its legal implications even as she sat in jail. Incredibly, Alicia found so much support from people in her country that they conducted rallies until she was released.
Things moved pretty quickly, and Uruguay legalized cannabis in 2014. Today, you can smoke or ingest cannabis no matter where you are in Uruguay, and you can even get it from regular pharmacies if you’re a registered medical cannabis user.
Citizens above the legal age of eighteen can gain access to cannabis. Through fingerprint recognition, they can purchase almost forty grams every month. The pharmacies contain two brands namely Alfa 1 and Beta 1. Both the brands contain very low THC (tetrahydrocannabinol) - the ingredient that causes the users to go high – and users don’t have to worry about being stoned.
In all honesty, THC is as important as CBD because they can’t work without each other. Many people blindly believe that while CBD is good, THC is bad; however, this is nothing but a false assumption. THC has incredible medicinal properties, but since some people cannot handle the high, they only look for CBD. THC also fights cancer and perhaps even prevents cancer, but unfortunately, the benefits are mostly ignored.
That being said, we live in a world where dangerous substances like alcohol and tobacco are legal and sold in every location across the world but herbs like cannabis are shamed, so it’s definitely a step in the right direction that users can at least get cannabis with high CBD. Although they can only get two brands with low THC, it seems that they are very happy, and with good reason, because there are many countries where even medical cannabis is still deemed illegal.