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LEGAL CANNABINOIDBASED MEDICINE IN MEXICO: CHALLENGES AND PERSPECTIVES Luis David Suárez Rodríguez, M.D. Specialist in Functional Medicine. Graduated from UNAM with a Medical Specialty in Acupuncture and Phytotherapy and another specialty in Physiological Regulation Medicine. He is a member of the American Conference for the Advancement of Medicine and of the Mexican and Spanish Association for Ozone Therapy. Since 2015, he has been part of the Scientific Advisory Committee of the International Scientific Committee in Ozone therapy. He has practiced functional medicine for over 12 years and has been working with medical Cannabis in his private practice for 8 years. Since 2011, he has been a member of the International Association of Cannabinoid Medicines (IACM). In 2018, together with other healthcare professionals, he founded the Mexican Association of Cannabinoid Medicine (AMMCann AC), a non-profit institution whose objective is the education of physicians and other healthcare professionals in the correct use of cannabinoid medicine in our country. He is currently the chair of the AMMCann AC. He is the author of several scientific articles on functional medicine and cannabinoid-based medicine, gives courses and conferences on these topics in both national and international forums.
| RESEARCH
Since last January 12, 2021, Mexico finally has a Regulation to prescribe Cannabinoid-Based Medicine (CBM) for thousands of patients and their families that have been waiting since 2017 for the publication of these so called “game rules”; that are nothing more than a set of rules and ordinances allowing them to access, via medical prescription, to drugs made from Cannabis and some of its more than 500 pharmacologically active compounds (including cannabinoids, terpenes, terpenoids and flavonoids). We consider that the published regulations are a valuable instrument for the development of the national CBM industry and the clinical practice of this kind of therapy, as it lays the foundation for scientific research and medical use of the plant in our country. The regulation considers the production of Cannabis in our territory and ensures the exploitation and protection of the national Cannabis species’ genomics. The regulation also allows the importation of raw material for CBM as isolated cannabinoids (including psychotropic such as Tetrahydrocannabinol, THC), molecular complexes or herbal medicines, while preventing the importation of Cannabis flower. With these rules, national farmers / producers are protected, and the opportunity arises to detonate the development of the Mexican fields. Additionally, these regulations allow the prescription of CBM by those professionals who are already prescribers, in accordance with the General Health Law (Mexican GHL) in force, i.e. physicians, homeopaths, dentists and veterinarians. In order to prescribe CBM, the use of the existing controlled drugs formulary and classified as Group I (narcotic drugs) according to Article 226 of the GHL (available to any of the aforementioned professionals at COFEPRIS) is proposed. The preparation of master formulas using CBM is also regulated which will allow from this moment on to have safe and affordable medicines, manufactured using good manufacturing practices and, what is most important from our patients’ point of view, available for immediate prescription.
