While the world is discussing the legalization of cannabis containing THC, taking a big step forward, Italy has decided to take two steps back. From September 22nd in our country CBD is officially considered a narcotic substance and products based on this molecule can only be sold in pharmacies upon medical prescription, as is already done with psychotropic drugs.
After years in which CBD has been sold and consumed freely in Italy, often on medical advice, administering it without any problem to a variety of adults and less adult people, frail and less frail, and even to animals, suddenly it seems that this substance has taken on mysterious narcotic qualities - despite the WHO denying it - and can only be sold as a drug, therefore to increased price. Even stranger, for now the Schillaci decree limits the purchase only of CBD products “to be ingested” and not those “to be smoked”… strange, right?
The World Health Organization, not the first to arrive, has long recognized the therapeutic qualities of CBD, such as its antispasmodic, anxiolytic, antiepileptic properties. Many Italian associations, such as Luca Coscioni, have raised their protests to the new decree: putting further bureaucratic obstacles to the use of CBD increases the stigma towards hemp and its consumers. According to the survey conducted by the same association on 1601 people who habitually use CBD, for 9 out of 10 people the new difficulties in finding the products will represent a worsening of their quality of life.
The risk is that everywhere the price of the products with CBD, which in a free market regime were decidedly cheap, increases significantly, potentially pushing many people to abandon their supplemental treatments based on this natural extract.
Since September 22nd, therefore, CBD has been considered a drug recommended only for some pathologies and only with a medical prescription: on the one hand, therefore, its potential of natural medicine, on the other hand, access to it is limited. This is absurd considering that unlike over-the-counter drugs such as aspirin, CBD is almost free of side effects: the most serious are dry mouth, decreased appetite, drowsiness and temporary lowering of blood pressure.
All this while in the rest of the world an anti-prohibitionist direction is being taken: Germany and Greece legalized medical cannabis in 2017, Ireland in 2019, Luxembourg and Malta lifted all vetoes in 2021, also allowing the recreational use of marijuana, as already happens in 19 US states.
