Florida Bill Would Let People With Opioid Use Disorder Qualify For Medical Marijuana

A newly introduced bill in the Florida Senate would expand eligibility for the state’s medical marijuana program by adding as a qualifying condition “an addiction to or dependence on an opioid drug.”

The legislation, SB 778, was filed Monday by Sen. Carlos Guillermo Smith (D). If enacted, it would take effect on July 1 of this year.

Current qualifying conditions for medical marijuana in Florida include cancer, epilepsy, glaucoma, HIV/AIDS, PTSD, ALS, Crohn’s disease, Parkinson’s disease, multiple sclerosis, terminal conditions and chronic pain caused by a qualifying condition, according regulators at the state’s Office of Medical Marijuana Use (OMMU).

The new bill has not yet been referred to a committee, according to the state Senate website.

Smith has in the past also filed legislation to legalize cannabis for adults, and last year he criticized Gov. Ron DeSantis (R) for spending the state’s opioid settlement funds on advertisements opposing Amendment 3, an industry-funded ballot measure that would have legalized adult-use cannabis in the state.

“Thousands of Floridians have died from opioid overdoses. ZERO Floridians have died from marijuana overdose,” he said on social media last October. “Yet DeSantis is spending MILLIONS of Florida’s opioid settlement money meant to fight the opioid crisis on his prohibitionist anti-freedom, anti-marijuana campaign.”

A variety of research has indicated that cannabis may help manage opioid use disorder and withdrawal symptoms, including a federally funded study published last year that looked at users in Los Angeles at a community site near a syringe exchange service program and methadone clinic.

Among the themes that emerged in that report was that marijuana co-use “assisted in developing patterns of reduced opioid use in a number of ways: 1) maintain opioid cessation and/or adhere to opioid use disorder treatment by managing cessation-specific symptoms, 2) manage symptoms of opioid withdrawal episodically and, 3) decrease opioid use due to low barrier accessibility of cannabis.”

Another recent study found that looked at cannabis legalization for adults observed a “consistent negative relationship” between legalization and fatal overdoses, with more significant effects in states that legalized cannabis earlier in the opioid crisis.

Also up for consideration in Florida’s legislature this session is a bill that would expand the state medical marijuana program by adding new qualifying conditions, waiving fees for military veterans, letting doctors issue recommendations through telehealth and allowing out-of-state patients to participate in the program, among other provisions.

That measure, SB 552, was introduced last Friday by Sen. Joe Gruters (R). If enacted, it would allow people to qualify for medical cannabis if they have a “condition for which the patient was prescribed an opioid drug listed as a Schedule II controlled substance.”

The legislation would also require the state Department of Health to establish procedures to permit medical marijuana patients registered in other states to obtain marijuana from Florida dispensaries. Officials would need to issue “medical marijuana use registry identification cards” to qualifying individuals within one of patients making the request.

Another change proposed by the bill would waive registration and renewal fees for participants in the program who were honorably discharged from the U.S. armed forces.

Other provisions would require patients to renew their registration in the system only once every two years rather than annually, allow physicians to recommend larger amounts of marijuana and reduce the frequency with which a patient would need to be evaluated by a doctor.

Patients could also be recommended medical marijuana through a telehealth visit with a doctor, rather than in person. Currently only renewals can be through telehealth visits, while initial certifications must be handled in person.

Gruters also reintroduced a proposal that would allow medical marijuana patients in the state to grow up to two cannabis plants at home—this time without separate provisions he had included in prior legislation that would have also cracked down on hemp-derived cannabinoids in the state.

That bill, SB 456, would allow state-registered cannabis patients 21 and older to grow up to two plants for personal use provided they first apply for and obtain a certificate from the state Department of Agriculture and Consumer Services.

Separately, lawmakers in Florida this session have also introduced bills that would protect medical marijuana patients from discrimination in government jobs and prevent state courts from restricting certain parental rights based solely on a person’s status as a qualified cannabis patient.

Ahead of last year’s election, Smith, the sponsor of the new Florida bill adding opioid use disorder as a qualifying condition, also pushed back on criticism of Amendment 3, contending for example that nothing in the constitutional amendment’s language that would prevent lawmakers from removing the state’s “vertical integration” requirement on the cannabis industry, which requires that a company needs to control every aspect of its cannabis operations, from cultivation to sales. He said at the time that removing the requirement would better promote competition in the industry.

Voters last fall nevertheless rejected Amendment 3, which received 56 percent support—a majority, but lower than the necessary 60 percent to adopt a change to the state’s constitution.

A poll released just last week by the Florida Chamber of Commerce found that marijuana legalization still has majority support in the state—but, at 53 percent, still isn’t high enough to be enacted.

The campaign behind the 2024 marijuana proposal, Smart and Safe Florida, recently filed a revised version of the marijuana initiative in hopes of getting a second shot in 2026.

DeSantis said last month that the latest version of the legalization initiative is in “big time trouble” with the state Supreme Court, predicting it will be blocked from going before voters next year.

Last year, the governor accurately predicted that the 2024 cannabis measure from the campaign would survive a legal challenge from the state attorney general. It’s not entirely clear why he feels this version would face a different outcome.

Smart and Safe Florida campaign made certain changes to the 2026 version, which seem responsive to criticism opponents raised during the 2024 push.

For example, it now specifically states that the “smoking and vaping of marijuana in any public place is prohibited.”Another section asserts that the legislature would need to approve rules dealing with the “regulation of the time, place, and manner of the public consumption of marijuana.”

There’s also new clarifying language prohibiting the sale of marijuana products that are marketed in a way that might be appealing to children.

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This latest iteration further explicitly states that nothing in the measure would “prohibit the legislature from providing for the home growing of marijuana by adults for their personal use and the reasonable regulation thereof.” That clarification may assuage concerns from certain advocates who criticized the lack of a home grow option in the original proposal.

Meanwhile, a Florida GOP senator claimed recently that the legalization campaign “tricked” President Donald Trump into supporting the measure by misleading him and the general public about key provisions.

Ahead of the election, Trump said in September that he felt Amendment 3 was “going to be very good” for the state.

Before making the comments, Trump met with the CEO of Trulieve, Kim Rivers, as well as with a GOP state senator who is in favor of the reform.

While Trump endorsed the Florida cannabis initiative—as well as federal rescheduling and industry banking access—he has since been silent on cannabis issues. And his cabinet choices have mixed records on marijuana policy.

The Congressional Research Service (CRS) said in a recent report that it “remains to be seen” how Trump will navigate marijuana policy in his second term, and it’s “unknown” whether the Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) will finalize a proposed rule to reschedule cannabis.

Opioid Prescriptions Drop In States That Legalize Marijuana, Federally Funded Study Shows, Suggesting Some Pain Patients Prefer Cannabis

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