“After eight years of using the same thing with great results, I don’t want her to have to go seek something else.”
By Graham Moomaw, Virginia Mercury
Before many people even knew what CBD was, a particular group of families was asking Virginia lawmakers to legalize it.
At the urging of parents with children diagnosed with severe epilepsy, Virginia passed a law in 2015 creating a legal shield allowing families to possess cannabis-derived CBD oils for medical use without fear of being criminally prosecuted due to CBD’s connection to marijuana.
Under the original law, that legal defense only applied to CBD—a substance typically derived from non-intoxicating hemp plants marketed as a remedy for aches and pains, sleep trouble, anxiety and other ailments—that was obtained specifically to prevent or reduce seizures. The initial 2015 law also included limits on THC, the compound in cannabis plants that gets users high and can come in both natural and synthetic forms.
To date, the anti-seizure medication Epidiolex remains the only CBD drug approved by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) as safe and effective for a specific medical use. In testimony before the General Assembly eight years ago, when Epidiolex was still three years away from FDA approval, many Virginia families said non-prescription CBD oil was the only thing that worked to alleviate their children’s seizures. State lawmakers responded accordingly, indicating they would work to create a legal…
