Charlotte Figi, namesake of Colorado CBD manufacturer, has died

Charlotte Figi, the namesake of a Colorado CBD company who became a symbol for the therapeutic potential of cannabidiol and medical cannabis, has reportedly died from complications associated with COVID-19, the illness caused by the coronavirus pandemic.

Charlotte’s death was announced late Tuesday in a Facebook post by a family friend. No time or location of death was provided.

Early Wednesday, the foundation co-founded by Paige Figi, Charlotte’s mother, said Charlotte’s death occurred on Tuesday and was linked to the coronavirus. She was 13.

“It is with a heavy heart that we write to let you know that Charlotte Figi passed away this afternoon from COVID-19 complications,” the Realm of Caring Foundation, a CBD research and advocacy group, wrote on Facebook.

The post has since been edited to remove the attribution of her death to COVID-19 complications.

According to a report from the Colorado Sun, Figi had written previous Facebook posts about a serious illness that struck all the members of her family and sent Charlotte to the hospital, but she never explicitly mentioned COVID-19. Figi wrote at one point that the family had been unable to get tested for the illness, the Sun reported.

Charlotte had suffered from seizures brought on by a rare form of epilepsy known as Dravet syndrome that were said to have drastically subsided after her mother started her on therapy with a high-cannabidiol strain of medical cannabis.

That strain was bred on a farm in Colorado by Joel Stanley and his brothers, who named their company Charlotte’s Web Holdings for her.