Will Cannabis Ever Be Covered by Medical Insurance?
Senior Wellness ~
Medicare & Schedule III + Cannabis
Will Cannabis Ever Be Covered by Medical Insurance?
by Sara Figueroa, contributing writer
AB CD
In December 2025, a presidential executive order renewed hope that cannabis may finally be moved from DEA Schedule I to Schedule III and recognized for its medical use potential. Now that 40 states, plus D. C., have established regulated medical marijuana programs, there is no question that the demand for cannabis-derived products will continue to increase, especially as the population ages. People who currently subscribe to Medicare are wondering if cannabis could finally be covered by their insurance, like the other medications they take to manage chronic illnesses and many other health issues. Hospitals and skilled nursing facilities are questioning their ability to allow patients to use cannabis. This month, we’ ll examine the potential and limitations of new healthcare policies around cannabis.
A Brief History of American Federal Health Insurance
Lyndon B. Johnson, signs Medicare into law in 1965, with Harry Truman at his side. It’ s unknown if they ever imagined it might help cover medical cannabis cost in the future.( Contrived photo.)
Medicare originally started as an idea during the Progressive Era when Teddy Roosevelt included national health insurance on his 1912 platform. Decades later, no progress had been made until Harry Truman’ s 1945 initiative to create a national health insurance fund open to all Americans of any age. However, Truman’ s efforts to pass a bill and later John F. Kennedy’ s efforts were unsuccessful. Medicare was finally signed into law in 1965 by President Lyndon B. Johnson, and what we now call Original Medicare was born.
Original Medicare became available to Americans age 65 and older, but over the decades, additional coverage options and eligible participants were added. In the beginning, Medicare consisted of Part A, which covers inpatient care, hospice, and home health, as well as Part B, which covers outpatient care, home health, and preventive care.
20 March 2026
In the 1990s, Medicare Advantage( aka Medicare Part C) plans were legislated to allow people to purchase their Medicare coverage on the private market. Eventually, Medicare Part D was signed into law by George W. Bush, allowing private insurers to offer optional prescription drug coverage. Other laws and acts have added to or modified Medicare in the past two decades to cap out-of-pocket expenses and reduce prescription drug costs.
Current Standing of Medical Cannabis and Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services( CMS)
At this point, you might be wondering how you ended up going down a rabbit hole about our national health insurance legislation in a magazine devoted to marijuana! Renewed interest in rescheduling cannabis from Schedule I to Schedule III has spotlighted the practical realities that would occur if the legal status of cannabis is changed. One of the many areas of confusion arises from Medicare Part C, since Medicare Advantage plans are privately owned, meaning they might consider adding cannabis coverage to their supplemental benefits.
Currently, whole-plant medicines are not FDA-approved, which will exclude medical marijuana from Medicare Part D prescription coverage. There are pros and cons to turning cannabis into a prescription drug. It simply wouldn’ t be feasible to turn the dispensary products we enjoy over-the-counter( OTC) today into widely accepted prescription drugs nationwide. Furthermore, it would mean removing something we love about cannabis— finding and choosing the unique combination of cannabinoids that our individual ECS needs. Schedule III could make FDA approval pathways easier for cannabis products, but that increases, not decreases, the risk of prescription-only access.
In 2026, another avenue for cannabis to be a“ covered benefit” officially closed. As mentioned, Medicare Advantage plans are privately owned and can offer Special Supplemental Benefits for the Chronically Ill( SSBCI), which are additional benefits for people living with specified chronic illnesses. These benefits can cover costs beyond direct medical care, ranging from groceries and transportation to pest control and air purifiers. Logically, this is also where OTC meds are covered. Could cannabis be covered here?
While the executive order in December 2025 to move cannabis to Schedule III renewed some of that hope and raised the discussion of how to build infrastructure for cannabis access, the reality is that rescheduling( or even descheduling) alone would not automatically allow any federally managed health plan to cover cannabis. Unfortunately, CMS finalized its ruling in January 2025 that cannabis would be officially excluded from SSBCI coverage. Citing a federal
Continued on page 30 ►