Welcome to Senior Cannabis Digest. This week we take a look at cannabis tax revenue and school lunches, legalization efforts in Pennsylvania, cannabis and weight loss and much more. Enjoy.
Cannabis and Public Policy
Cannabis and public policy can make for strange bedfellows, particularly when it comes to how best to use tax dollars generated by cannabis sales.
Case in point: The governor of Arkansas, Gov. Sarah Huckabee Sanders (R) —not known as a pro-cannabis advocate—has signed a bill that directs the state to use medical marijuana tax revenue to fund free school breakfasts for students.
According to Tom Angell, who covered the story for Marijuana Moment, the legislation will supplement federal free and reduced-price meal funds with money from a state Food Insecurity Fund, paid for by cannabis taxes as well as private grants and money from the state’s general fund.
Angell noted the new law will provide meals to students regardless of whether or not they qualify for free or reduced-cost food under federal law. Some supporters have said that stigma sometimes prevents families from taking advantage of those programs, leaving children hungry.
Said Sanders, “Free school breakfast will help ease the burden on families just trying to put food on their tables and make sure kids are fueled and ready to learn. Delivering for our kids is a bipartisan issue, and I’m proud to see us working together to take action.”
The governor observed in her State of the State speech that the use of medical marijuana funds would make the program “sustainable for years to come.”
In his article, Angell points out that Sanders has historically resisted cannabis policy reform. For instance, in November of 2024 Sanders opposed a ballot initiative that would have expanded Arkansas’s medical marijuana program.
However, in 2023 she signed a bill into law clarifying that medical marijuana patients in Arkansas can obtain concealed carry licenses for firearms despite federal law still prohibiting cannabis users from possessing guns.
As of May of 2024 over 100,000 residents had registered for patient cards. This gives them access to the medical marijuana program.
To learn more, we urge you to read Tom Angell’s excellent reporting in the February 21, 2025 issue of Marijuana Moment.net.
Cannabis Corner
State legislators who think that refusing to legalize the recreational use of cannabis will prevent folks from purchasing it elsewhere, legally or illegally, are missing out on an economic opportunity.
That’s the key message of a tweet posted on X on February 24, 2025 by Governor Josh Shapiro of the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania.
Wrote Governor Shapiro, “Let’s not kid ourselves. Pennsylvanians who want to buy adult-use cannabis are just driving across the border to one of our five neighboring states where it’s legal. Up to 60% of the customers at those stores just over the border are Pennsylvanians, and we’re losing out on an industry that will bring in $1.3 billion in new revenue to our Commonwealth. Let’s work together — Republicans and Democrats alike — and legalize adult-use cannabis.”
Long an advocate for legalization, from his tweet Shapiro seems well aware that lines on a map do not prevent folks from driving from one state to another and if you legalize it, they will come and buy it and be taxed.
Stephen L. Bartlett, of the law firm Foley Hoag, recently posted on the firm’s web site, “The Governor’s budget proposal estimates that legalizing adult-use cannabis will yield $250M in annual revenue and will “generate $1.3B over the first 5 years as the marketplace gets up and running.”
Foley Hogg maintains a specialized practice in cannabis law.
According to Carmen Russell-Sluchansky, reporting for public television station WHYY, Shapiro acknowledged in his recent budget proposal that supporting legalization was a “hard” decision to make “as a father of four and as the former chief law enforcement officer of this commonwealth.”
However, he added that he took the time to study the proposal and “understand the impacts.”
Russell-Sluchansky noted in an article that former Gov. Tom Wolf first proposed legalizing cannabis in 2019, but he was unsuccessful. Shapiro was similarly unsuccessful when he proposed it in his budget last year.
To learn more, we encourage you to read Carmen Russell-Sluchansky‘s clear and concise reporting. His article appeared online in the February 5, 2025 issue of WHYY.org.
And just for the record, Kevin Costner never said “If you build it, they will come.” The script for “Field of Dreams” says “He will come.” Impress your friends, win a bar bet.
https://whyy.org/articles/pennsylvania-medical-marijuana-cannabis-josh-shapiro/
Cannabis and Weight Loss
Substances found in cannabis that are sometimes referred to as “minor cannabinoids” may have a major impact on weight loss, blood pressure and cholesterol. That’s a key finding of a study that was conducted by the company NeX Therapeutics and published in the journal Cannabis.
So says Ben Adlin, reporting for Marijuana Moment. According to Adlin, the study analyzed outcomes among 44 people who were administered either oral strips containing a mixture of the two cannabinoids—THCV and CBD—or a placebo. Participants took one strip daily for 90 says and were evaluated for weight loss and certain metabolic markers.
Said Dr. Gregory Smith, the founder and CEO of plant-based medicine company NeX Therapeutics, and lead author of the study, “Use of the THCV/CBD strip was associated with statistically significant weight loss, decreases in abdominal girth, systolic blood pressure, and total and LDL cholesterol.”
Adlin noted participants—31 of whom were female and 13 of whom were male, with a combined average age of about 52 years—were given either a placebo or one of two different mucoadhesive oral strips. A lower-dose version contained 8 milligrams of THCV and 10 mg CBD, while a higher-dose version had 16 mg THCV and 20 mg CBD. Subjects received a reminder to take a dose each day on an empty stomach and report any side effects, and they agreed to refrain from using cannabis or other cannabinoid-based products.
In addition, participants were not asked to make any changes to their diet or exercise routines.
The research team reported in the article that while both doses facilitated weight loss, the stronger dosage appeared to perform better.
Concluded the researchers in their article, “In summary, 90 day use of once-daily THCV and CBD-infused mucoadhesive strips was associated with clinically significant weight loss, decreases in abdominal girth, systolic blood pressure, and total and LDL cholesterol. The 16 mg/20 mg daily dose in Group B was superior for weight loss compared to the 8mg/10mg daily dose in Group A.”
In his article, Adlin also points to other studies that contend that minor cannabinoid compounds might affect metabolism and, by extension, weight loss. Adlin’s reporting is first rate and his article can be found in the February 24, 2025 issue of Marijuana Moment.net.
Cannabis Quote of the Week
“In short, the viral study claiming that marijuana can affect your memory should be taken with a grain of salt. It’s just one of many studies backing up the fact that weed will always affect people differently, given that there are already several other studies backing up the use of cannabis to improve cognition – even among medical marijuana users who suffer from physical ailments.
Cannabis certainly does offer neuroprotective benefits for the brain, and it can aid with other cognitive functions including creativity, sleep, reduction in anxiety, and much more. We must still remember that even with studies proving this, cannabis use during adolescence should be prohibited and keep in mind that individual variability will always play a role in the outcome.”—Dana Smith
Ms. Smith’s comments are taken from an article she wrote for Cannabis.net that takes a deep dive into a study that claims that cannabis use can cause memory loss, especially when consumers engage in what the study described as “heavy use.”
In the study, which has received a significant amount of coverage in the mainstream media, researchers from the University of Colorado Anschutz Medical Campus conducted what is considered to be the biggest study of its kind, specifically analyzing the impact of both lifetime and recent cannabis use on the cognitive function of over 1,000 individuals whose ages ranged from 22 to 36.
In her article Smith notes that for the purposes of the study, heavy users were defined as the young adults who consumed weed over a thousand times in their lifetime. On the other hand, moderate users were defined as those who used cannabis 10 to 999 times, while nonusers were those who had consumed cannabis less than ten times.
The researchers used MRI tests to assess neural activity among participants, all of whom were given a variety of cognitive tasks to complete; the tasks tested different functions in the brain including memory, motor skills, language, emotion, and reward.
Investigators also used brain imaging technology to measure working memory, which refers to the brain’s short-term storage of information. Humans use working memory in everyday problem solving, reasoning, and other activities.
Smith points out that the researchers reported that the parts of the brain that are responsible for decision making, emotional processing, attention, and memory showed reduced activity among heavy cannabis users.
However, in an effort to create a more balanced context for the findings, Smith notes that the researchers acknowledged that the reduced activity state is not necessarily permanent and abstaining from cannabis before engaging in certain cognitive tasks may help performance.
Said the study’s lead author, Joshua Gowin, PhD, assistant professor of radiology at the University of Colorado School of Medicine on the University of Colorado Anschutz Medical Campus, “There are a lot of questions we still need answers to regarding how cannabis impacts the brain. Large, long-term studies are needed next to understand whether cannabis use directly changes brain function, how long these effects last and the impact on different age groups.”
This statement, while it didn’t generate headlines, does present a more malleable picture of the effects of cannabis on cognition.
In her article Smith also cites other studies that suggest cannabis can affect different individuals in different ways. So while cannabis use can make some people sharper and more focused with cognitive tasks, it may not have the same effect for others – or even the majority of a population, as seen in the University of Colorado study.
Smith goes on to state there are also studies that offer evidence that cannabis may actually improve cognitive function in others. For example, she points to Dr Staci Gruber’s Marijuana Investigations for Neuroscientific Discovery (MIND) program of the McLean Hospital. Researchers there discovered through longitudinal observational studies that medical marijuana patients showed improved performances in cognitive tasks that required them to use executive functioning.
Said Gruber, “Rather than getting worse, they’re actually getting better.” According to Gruber, this “improvement” reflects the fact there are patients who can think more clearly since their symptoms have been alleviated due to medical marijuana use.
While Smith does not dismiss the University of Colorado study as clickbait, she does take the position that it is but one study and its findings need to be evaluated against other studies that offer an alternative view of the impact cannabis may have on cognition.
To learn more, you can read Dana Smith’s article, which appeared in the February 16, 2025 issue of Cannabis.net.
https://cannabis.net/blog/news/what-you-need-to-know-about-the-viral-medical-study-claiming-cannabis-causes-memory-loss
Cannabis and the Law
It’s like Sly Stone said, “Different strokes for different folks.” Or in this case, different states and cannabis.
For instance, there’s one state that takes in hundreds of millions of dollars in tax revenue from legal cannabis sales and there’s another one that receives much less.
One state is home to a robust and thriving cannabis sector while the other has had one problem after another regarding cannabis, from its rollout of legalization to eliminating the presence of grey market sources.
And in one state a legislator has introduced a proposal that would stop police from using the odor of raw or burnt cannabis as grounds for a vehicle search, so long as the driver is at least 21 years old.
The governor of the other state, on the other hand, supports a proposal that would allow police who claim to smell marijuana to force a driver to take a drug test—a plan, according to Ben Adlin of Marijuana Moment—that’s drawing pushback not just from reform advocates but also from the state’s Assembly majority leader and the governor-appointed head of the Office of Cannabis Management (OCM).
Now if you’re guessing that the first state is Illinois, you are correct. And if you are guessing that the “other” state is New York, you are correct again.
“And so on, and so on and scooby dooby doo.”
To learn more about this tale of two states, we suggest reading TG Branfalt’s reporting on the Illinois proposal in the February 24, 2025 issue of Ganjapreneur and Ben Adlin’s reporting on Governor Hochul’s proposal in New York in the February 25, 2025 issue of Marijuana Moment.
Senior Cannabis Digest is compiled and edited by Joe Kohut and John Kohut. You can reach them at joe.kohut@gmail.com and at 347-528-8753.
