California Should Cap THC Levels In Marijuana And Test A Government-Run Cannabis Monopoly, State-Commissioned Report Says

A new report released on Wednesday by a panel of experts convened by California’s Department of Public Health (CDPH) makes a number of major policy recommendations that would radically alter the landscape of the state’s marijuana market, for example by limiting the THC potency of cannabis flower and concentrates, requiring products be sold in plain packaging and setting up a government-run cannabis monopoly along the lines of how stores work in Quebec, Canada.

The new recommendations come in a report from the High Potency Cannabis Think Tank, which consists of scientists and public health experts tapped by CDPH “to provide analysis of the problem of increasing potency of cannabis and cannabis products and to formulate regulations to address it.”

Other recommendations include taxing marijuana based on THC potency and more strictly limiting advertising that might appeal to children.

Members of the committee represent institutions such as RTI International; the University of California in San Francisco, Los Angeles and Irvine; the University of Southern California; the University of Washington; Stanford University; the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health; the Public Health Institute; and Kaiser Permanente’s research division.

The report highlights 10 top suggestions in terms of their likely policy impact, including around product potency, advertising, taxation, packaging and labeling, public education and more. It says the recommendations’ goals are intended to reduce the incidence of cannabis use disorder and negative mental health consequences associated with cannabis use, minimize use and frequent use by people under 21 and reduce use by drivers and during pregnancy.

“In developing the recommendations, we sought policies that would not contribute to stigma related to cannabis use, nor recreate past inequitable patterns of penalization, focusing primarily on addressing the supply side, pricing, and educating consumers,” the report says.

In terms of recommended caps on high-potency products, the panel advised a 60 percent THC limit on cannabis concentrates, a 25 percent THC limit on marijuana flower and a limit of 10 milligrams of THC “per physical piece or liquid beverage container” in ingestible products, excluding tinctures.

Further, the panel said that higher-THC products—flower above 20 percent, inhaled products above 35 percent and edibles over 10 mg per package, if permitted—should be sold only in plain packaging, with no branding or marketing allowed.

“Ideally,” the report says, “this should extend to all cannabis products.”

California should also ban “the use of added flavors (including fruits, mint, menthol, vanilla, chocolate, spices, and other common food flavors) in all inhaled products, whether natural or synthetic” as well as “prohibit language and images that could lead consumers to believe the product has flavors other than those of cannabis,” the group says.

Another top suggestion from the CDPH-convened panel is that the state should consider “testing, promoting, or facilitating a Quebec-style public monopoly approach to cannabis sales, particularly in jurisdictions that have not yet legalized cannabis sales.”

NEW REPORT: Scientific panel warns that high-potency #cannabis products in CA pose serious health risks & recommends 20 policies to reduce harms, like #THC caps, flavored cannabis bans & plain packaging.

Read Report: https://t.co/BKz7tKUXv0#CannabisPolicy #PublicHealth pic.twitter.com/xQ4XBaWayD

— Getting it Right from the Start (@GetItRightonMJ) October 30, 2024

Currently all cannabis in Quebec must be purchased through the state-owned Société Québécoise du Cannabis (SQDC).

In California, meanwhile, more than half of cities and counties still locally ban the sale of marijuana following voters’ passage of statewide legalization in 2016.

The state’s tax structure for marijuana products should also be updated to structure excise taxes “to be proportional to the milligrams of THC in the taxed product, applicable to all cannabis products.” Currently taxes are calculated based on a product’s sale price.

Many of the recommendations focus on reducing the appeal of higher-potency cannabis products to youth, such as an advised ban on billboard advertising and “any other general public-facing advertising,” which the report says is because “billboard advertising reaches children, and because a high percentage of the market is high potency.”

“This report provides an urgently needed roadmap for implementing policies that do a better job of balancing the benefits of a legal cannabis market with the potential risks to public health,” co-author Rosalie Liccardo Pacula, a professor and chair of the Health Policy and Management Department at the University of Southern California‘s public policy school, said in a statement about the report.

“Our recommendations focus on regulating cannabis, as the voters intended, but doing so in a way that considers the harms from excess use of a legal intoxicant and protects youth,” she said. “Restricting the availability of high-potency products, redesigning taxes so they are based on THC content, and enforcing youth access laws and marketing restrictions are possible and are strategies already being implemented in other legal jurisdictions.”

Researchers also called for at least another $10 million or more in cannabis tax revenue annually to fund public health campaigns “on the risks of high potency cannabis, including mental health risks,” specifically prioritizing “use during pregnancy, drugged driving, and education for youth and seniors.”

The report says the money should also fund research and testing of public messaging campaigns.

And to better keep tabs on the effects of high-potency marijuana products, the team called for “the tracking and regular reporting of negative health outcomes associated with high potency products in California hospitals, hospital emergency departments, and ambulatory care settings.”

Beyond the top 10 policies in terms of expected impact, the report suggests restricting advertising of cannabis products with over 35 percent THC (or 20 percent THC for flower products), requiring retailers to offer lower-dose (e.g. under 10 percent THC) options, establishing more robust age-gating for cannabis websites, prohibiting discounts of higher-potency THC products, mandating specific warning labels be affixed to higher-potency products and generally stepping up enforcement of regulations already intended to curb products’ appeal to children.

High Potency Cannabis Think Tank / CDPH

“As cannabis legalization advances, our report underscores the urgent need for stronger regulatory protections and public education about the dangers of high-potency cannabis,” said co-author Daniele Piomelli, a professor at UC Irvine School of Medicine and director of the Center for the Study of Cannabis. “It’s critical to limit exposure to these products, especially for youth, pregnant individuals, and people with mental health conditions, to reduce the potential for long-term health harms.”

Marijuana has grown increasingly more potent in recent decades, the report notes, and “over the more than six years of California’s legal adult-use commercial market, the trend toward higher potency has continued unabated, mirroring national trends.”

The report says that while its focus is the state’s regulated adult-use marijuana market, “the parallel emergence of a major intoxicating hemp market cannot be ignored.”

“Edible hemp products with more Delta-9-THC then legal cannabis edibles can be legally sold to a 10-year-old in our state at any corner store,” the report says. “There is also a vast market of illegally sold inhalable and edible hemp products with high doses of psychoactive cannabinoids like Delta-8-THC, HHC and THC-P, synthetically derived from CBD in hemp.”

Authors noted that recent emergency regulations from Gov. Gavin Newsom (D) aim to address the issue of unregulated hemp products. Announced last month, the new rules outlaw intoxicating hemp products and those with any “detectable amount of total THC.”

An industry effort to halt enforcement of the new regulations banning fell short earlier this month, with a state judge denying a request for a temporary restraining order. The suit says the rules are based on a faulty declaration of “emergency” and come after officials failed to effectively implement hemp regulation legislation that was enacted in 2021.

Meanwhile, states around the country are moving to enact similar cannabinoid restrictions in an effort to limit the proliferation of intoxicating hemp-derived products following the federal 2018 Farm Bill’s legalization of the crop. New Jersey Gov. Phil Murphy (D), for example, signed a bill into law last month putting hemp products under the purview of the state’s cannabis commission, a move that’s also sparked a court challenge.

Somewhat similar discussions about how to regulate hemp derivatives are playing out at the federal level, as congressional lawmakers consider legislative provisions to impose a general ban on hemp-derived cannabinoids such as delta-8 THC.

Rep. Mary Miller’s (R-IL) amendment to the 2024 Farm Bill, for example, was approved by a House committee in May and would remove cannabinoids that are “synthesized or manufactured outside of the plant” from the federal definition of legal hemp. The change is backed by prohibitionists as well as some marijuana companies, who’ve described the restriction as a fix to a “loophole” that was created under the 2018 Farm Bill that federally legalized hemp and its derivatives.

Anti-drug groups, law enforcement and some health organizations have called on Congress to embrace the ban, arguing that “trying to regulate semi-synthetic cannabinoids will not work.”

In addition to Miller’s amendment in the 2025 Farm Bill, the House Appropriations Committee in July approved a separate spending bill that contains a similar provision to prohibit cannabinoid products such as delta-8 THC and CBD containing any “quantifiable” amount of THC.

Hemp-derived cannabinoids also came up in a recent federal appeals court decision in which judges ruled that cannabinoids derived from hemp, such as THC-O-acetate, indeed qualify as hemp and are legal under the 2018 Farm Bill. In making that ruling, the court rejected the Drug Enforcement Administration’s more restrictive interpretation of the law.

How to address hemp-derived cannabinoids has caused some fractures within the cannabis community, and in some cases marijuana businesses have found themselves on the same side as prohibitionists in pushing a derivatives ban.

As for THC potency, meanwhile, GOP House and Senate lawmakers well-known for opposing marijuana reform earlier this year introduced a concurrent resolution calling on federal agencies to study the potential risks of high potency THC products.

New York’s governor earlier this year, meanwhile, called for the elimination of a THC potency tax as part of her executive budget, aiming to reduce costs for consumers in a way that could make the regulated market more competitive against illicit operators.

Separately, some states have run into issues of lab operators allegedly inflating THC potency numbers in order to boost products’ appeal with consumers, who sometimes shop for products based on their advertised strength.

Meanwhile in California, Newsom recently signed a bill to legalize cannabis cafes in the state—just one day after vetoing a separate proposal to allow small marijuana growers to sell their products directly to consumers at state-organized farmers markets.

He also signed a series of modest reform proposals over the weekend, including a proposal to make it so medical marijuana donated to low-income patients is tax-exempt and another measure to prevent what advocates call the “double taxation” of marijuana by restricting the ability of local governments to calculate their cannabis levies after state taxes are already applied.

While the governor supports cannabis legalization, he’s been notably reserved about various drug policy proposals in recent years, for example vetoing legislation to legalize psychedelics and allow safe consumption sites for illegal drugs, in addition to nixing the farmers market proposal.

Separately, a state-funded effort is underway in California to analyze the genetic information of various marijuana strains in order to preserve the state’s rich history of cannabis cultivation. It’s part of a project meant not only to acknowledge the past but also protect the future of legacy growing regions such as the Emerald Triangle.

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