ASA Outlines Patient Rights After Medical Cannabis Rescheduling
Cannabis advocacy organization Americans for Safe Access (ASA) on Tuesday released a new medical cannabis patient and caregiver guide designed to help individuals understand and exercise their rights under the federal reclassification of medical cannabis from Schedule I to Schedule III under the Controlled Substances Act.
The guide, “Medical Cannabis Patients: Claim Your Federal Protections & Privileges,” seeks to explain what the federal moves mean for patients, caregivers, providers, advocates, and institutions.
In a statement, Steph Sherer, ASA founder and executive director, said that patients “have waited decades for federal recognition, but recognition alone does not protect someone from losing housing, employment, healthcare, benefits, or custody.”
“Patients now have new federal protections and privileges, but they must be ready to claim them. ASA created this guide because rights do not enforce themselves, and stigma will not disappear just because the law changed.” — Sherer in a press release
The guide outlines rights and protections now afforded to medical cannabis patients under the Americans with Disabilities Act, the Fair Housing Act, and Section 504 of the Rehabilitation Act; however, it warns that “agencies, employers, landlords, healthcare facilities, and public programs will not automatically update their policies just because the law has changed.”
“Federal medical cannabis laws have changed. Stigma will delay implementation,” Sherer said in a statement. “Some systems will move slowly. Some will resist. Some may try to ignore this change altogether. That is why patients, caregivers, providers, advocates, and allies must act now.”
The guide provides tools patients and caregivers can use to assert their rights, request written explanations, document discrimination, and demand individualized review.
The ASA also launched a campaign to end medical cannabis patient discrimination and is collecting reports from patients, caregivers, veterans, workers, tenants, parents, service members, and others who have experienced discrimination due to their medical cannabis use.
“Documentation is not just paperwork,” Sherer said in a statement. “It is how individual experiences become evidence for policy change. Every denial letter, drug testing policy, housing notice, or refusal of care helps show federal agencies and lawmakers where outdated systems are still harming patients.”
The campaign is also calling on the administration of President Donald Trump (R) to immediately issue guidance for medical cannabis patients under the new rules.