The chief of the Mexican state Baja California provided a full-throated endorsement of medical hashish final week as debate surrounding the difficulty continues to rankle lawmakers within the nation.
Marina del Pilar Avila, who serves as governor of Baja California, informed reporters that she is “completely behind the legalization of marijuana as a solution to deal with persistent diseases,” as quoted by the news outlet Border Report.
As the outlet noted, at present “the Mexican Senate is debating legalizing the widespread use of pot in Mexico.”
However Avila’s endorsement of the therapy is just not shared by different leaders in Baja California.
Norma Bustamante, the mayor of Mexicali, which is the capital metropolis of Baja California, “got here out towards Avila’s assertion” virtually instantly, in keeping with Border Report.
“As a public servant, I’m all the time respectful of the regulation and as a lady, mom and grandmother of youngsters, I’m towards using medication together with marijuana and even cigarettes,” Bustamante mentioned, as quoted by Border Report.
Adrián Medina Amarillas, who serves because the well being secretary of Baja California, begs to vary.
“When the nation permits using medical marijuana, we’ll be among the many first to make use of it to deal with persistent diseases that don’t reply to traditional remedies amongst them most cancers and Parkinson’s,” Medina mentioned, as quoted by the outlet.
Lengthy a strong producer and exporter of hashish, Mexico’s marijuana legal guidelines are shrouded in ambiguity. As Leafly puts it: “It’s sophisticated.”
“Marijuana at present exists in a authorized flux state in Mexico. It’s not completely authorized, but it surely’s not completely unlawful both,” Leafly explains. “Medical hashish is technically authorized in Mexico, however there isn’t a authorized framework in place to acquire a prescription or show one’s personal authorized medical standing. Possession of as much as 5 grams of hashish for any goal, medical or in any other case, has been successfully decriminalized nationwide, though native and federal police typically don’t respect this standing.”
As for leisure pot, possession “of as much as 5 grams of hashish is successfully authorized because it was decriminalized federally in 2009, together with restricted quantities of quite a lot of different medication, by authorities in search of to unlock assets and separate public well being points from site visitors crimes.”
“Individuals discovered with lower than 5 grams of hashish ought to, in keeping with the regulation, be inspired into free therapy packages, however in actuality they’re nonetheless coerced into paying police bribes to be launched from custody. They’re typically not prosecuted for private quantities, although the regulation states that buying and possessing quantities in extra of 5 grams can carry jail sentences of 10 months to three years,” Leafly explains.
The unsure nature of that coverage has prompted advocates and lawmakers to name for complete hashish reform.
In August, Olga Sánchez Cordero, president of the Senate Board of Administrators, “urged approval of the reform to control hashish, since she thought-about that Mexico is lagging behind within the matter in comparison with Latin America and the world,” according to the Mexican news magazine Proceso.
The journal reported that, in Sánchez Cordero’s inaugural speech, she “recounted that Senator Margarita Valdez, president of the Higher Home Well being Committee, held a gathering through which representatives of Latin American international locations requested her why Mexico didn’t regulate all the pieces associated to consumption of marijuana.”
“Now Senator Margarita Valdez informed me that in a gathering she had, all our South American, Chilean, Argentine, Colombian brothers, in brief, requested her when Mexico will take this necessary step within the regulation of hashish. For my part, and I inform you this with all sincerity, I consider that we’re falling behind the world if we don’t make progress on this subject,” Sánchez Cordero, as quoted by Proceso.
Moreover, the outlet reported that she “talked about different points on the legislative agenda which can be related and that might be mentioned through the subsequent common session that begins on September 1, such because the Nationwide Code of Civil and Household Procedures, shopper safety, problems with a power and the safety of the human rights of migrants.”