Get Your Medical Marijuana Card
In California

Cannabis in California is legal for both medical and recreational use. In recent decades, the state has been at the forefront of efforts to reform cannabis laws, beginning in 1972 with the nation’s first ballot initiative attempting to legalize cannabis. California was the first state to establish a medical cannabis program, enacted by Proposition 215 in 1996 and Senate Bill 420 in 2003. Proposition 215, also known as the Compassionate Use Act allows people the right to obtain and use cannabis for any illness if they obtain a recommendation from a doctor.

Recreational usage of marijuana is legal under Proposition 64. Immediately upon certification of the November 2016 ballot results, adults age 21 or older were allowed to:

• Possess, transport, process, purchase, obtain, or give away, without any compensation whatsoever, no more than one ounce of dry cannabis or eight grams concentrated cannabis to adults the age of 21 or older.
• Possess, plant, cultivate, harvest, dry, or process no more than six live plants and the produce of those plants in a private residence, in a locked area not seen from normal view, in compliance with all local ordinances.
• Smoke or ingest cannabis.
• Possess, transport, purchase, obtain, use, manufacture, or give away marijuana paraphernalia to peoples the age of 21 or older.

Users may not:

• Smoke it where tobacco is prohibited.
• Possess, ingest or smoke within 1,000 feet of a day care, school, or youth center while children are present (except within a private residence and if said smoke is not detectable to said children).
• Manufacture concentrated cannabis using a volatile solvent without a license under Chapter 3.5 of Division 8 or Division 10 of the Business and Professions Code.
• Possess an open container or marijuana paraphernalia while in the driver or passenger seat of a vehicle used for transportation.
• Smoke or ingest marijuana while operating a vehicle used for transportation.
• Smoke or ingest marijuana while riding in the passenger seat or compartment of a vehicle.

Legal sales for non-medical use are allowed by law beginning January 1, 2018, following formulation of new regulations on retail market by the state’s Bureau of Medical Cannabis Regulation (to be renamed Bureau of Marijuana Control). Proposition 64 is not meant in any way to affect, amend, or restrict the statutes provided for medical cannabis in California under Proposition 215.

Now that recreational marijuana is legal, do I still need a medical recommendation?

Patients with a doctor’s recommendation can grow or possess larger quantities of marijuana than recreational users. In addition, if you are under 21, you must have a doctor’s recommendation to purchase marijuana, but there are some dispensaries have discontinued sales to patients under 21, even with recommendation, to fit within recreational dispensary rules. Finally, a county-issued medical marijuana ID card exempts you from tax on marijuana purchases.

How do patients get medical marijuana recommendations?

Doctors do not prescribe marijuana. Federal law specifically prohibits prescription of Schedule I drugs, including marijuana. Instead, doctors can recommend marijuana for appropriate conditions. Patients who are living with cancer, anorexia, AIDS, chronic pain, spasticity, glaucoma, arthritis, migraine, or any other illness for which marijuana provides relief are mentioned in Prop. 215. Physicians have recommended marijuana for numerous other conditions, including insomnia, depression, anxiety, PTSD, and many more.

Most medicinal marijuana recommendations are made by doctors who specialize in evaluating patients for recommendation, rather than the patients’ usual physician. The recommending doctor should review patients’ existing medical records before making a recommendation, including reviewing any other medications the patients are already using.