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A sample tray of cannabis samples is loaded into the liquid chromatography-mass spectrometer at the Wadsworth Center

has had to devise an elaborate system in which it functions mostly as an intermediary: Laboratories order products through Emerald, but the products are created and evaluated by third-party accredited PT providers located in the customer’ s own state. Moreover, products must have a sufficiently low concentration of tetrahydrocannabinol— the principle euphoria-inducing cannabis ingredient— to be exempt from DEA regulations.

In New York, where the Wadsworth Center performed potency testing on roughly 25 to 30 lots of medical marijuana per month last year— the first year of legal medical marijuana sales in the state— there are no commercial cannabis PT providers. Walsh said Wadsworth relies on internal demonstrations of competency and obtains good concordance with manufacturers’ reported potency values. So far, no private laboratories have applied for approval to conduct cannabis testing in New York. If they did, Walsh said various PT options have been discussed, but no definitive solution identified.( In addition to potency, Wadsworth tests medical cannabis for nine types of bacteria, three types of fungus, five mycotoxins and nine metals or metalloids. It also screens for over 100 pesticides.)

According to The Economist, the entire US cannabis

“ The future is looking really good for the cannabis industry”

Despite rumblings from the Trump administration about stricter enforcement of federal drug policies, several of those interviewed for this article said it is hard to envision a rollback of the looser, new cannabis laws. In fact, the very

election that propelled Donald Trump to the presidency saw the legalization of recreational marijuana in four additional states— California, Nevada, Maine and Massachusetts.

Last year, Colorado’ s roughly 2,600 licensed cannabis businesses moved a billion dollars worth of recreational and medicinal products and paid the state $ 50 million in taxes. According to The Economist, the entire US cannabis industry was worth about $ 6 billion in 2016 and is expected to grow substantially when recreational sales begin in California in 2018.

Even the US government has shown a schizophrenic attitude toward marijuana, with FDA’ s approval of Syndros ® cannabis oral solution as a Schedule II drug in March and the agency’ s ongoing review of a second cannabinoid drug, Sativex ®, which is already legal in more than a dozen countries outside the US.

According to a study reported in JAMA Internal Medicine, the 13 states with medical cannabis laws in effect before October 2010 experienced a 25 % lower mean annual opioid overdose rate during 1999-2010 than states without such laws.

While there are still health and safety concerns associated with cannabis, a new National Academies of Sciences, Engineering and Medicine report found“ conclusive or substantial evidence” that cannabis or cannabinoids are an effective treatment for chronic pain, chemotherapy-induced nausea and vomiting, and multiple sclerosis spasticity symptoms.

The same report, released in January, recommends that CDC, APHL, state and local health agencies and assorted partners“ fund and support improvements” to federal and state-based public health surveillance efforts to monitor the health effects of cannabis use. It explicitly calls for the development of novel diagnostic technologies to rapidly assess cannabis exposure and for statebased programs to analyze the chemical composition of cannabis and related products.