The announced boom of the global medical cannabis market
In an article in “Global Market News Wire” dated July 23, it is estimated that the medical cannabis market will grow by over 40,907 million dollars by 2024, a thriving and promising sector of the industry that is attractive to big pharma : the first major agreement between the two worlds dates back to December 2018, between Sandoz AG, a global leader in the production of pharmaceuticals, and Tilray, a pioneer in the production, research and distribution of cannabis for therapeutic use.
The overall market has grown rapidly due to enhanced investment strategies and a growing consumer trend. According to the International Association for the Study of Pain (IASP), any pain that persists for more than six months is defined as “chronic” and affects between 30% and 50% of the world's population. Over the past decade, researchers
from all over the world have shown keen interest in understanding the therapeutic benefits of marijuana high in compounds such as tetrahydrocannabinol, cannabidiol, cannabigerol, cannabidivarin etc., to treat chronic pain. Not only that.
According to the latest research cited by the World Health Organization (WHO), cancer is the second leading cause of death in patients globally, and patients in the final stages of cancer and during chemotherapy suffer from tremendous pain and nausea. Cannabis is useful in addressing both these issues. That is why health agencies around the world are developing effective guidelines to legalize the production and sale of cannabis for medicinal purposes and in the meantime have made cannabis available in hospital pharmacies to meet the need of patients by assuring them that it is not adulterated and will not have any harmful effects on their health.
North America currently dominates the medical marijuana market with a 52% share. Here, in the more than thirty states where it is legal, it is mostly used by geriatric patients suffering from chronic pain and DOLCE VITA · September-October 2019 · 71 those suffering from cancer. Europe , where the approval of medical marijuana faces enormous challenges because there is no unison among local regulatory agencies, has the potential to reach 55 billion by 2028. The Netherlands, the Czech Republic and Germany are already ahead on the path. While we will discuss Italy in depth elsewhere, Great Britain, Ireland and France are the ones who have recently revised their positions on the matter with developments still to be evaluated.
According to a 2018 United Nations study, Great Britain is among the world's largest producers of legal cannabis. This is surprising at first glance if you consider the country's policy on marijuana, but it comes from the work of a multinational, headquartered in the United Kingdom, which operates on an industrial scale for the production of drugs : this is GW Pharmaceuticals, a company that markets Epidiolex, the first CBD-based drug approved by the American FDA for the treatment of epilepsy, and Sativex, for the treatment of muscle spasticity caused by multiple sclerosis. Most of GW's cannabis is grown under contract by British Sugar in its 18-hectare greenhouse in Norfolk, a structure equivalent in size to 23 football fields. Despite this, only since November 1, 2019 have doctors been authorized to prescribe medical cannabis to their patients .
Ireland, on the other hand, launched a pilot program last June to provide access to medical cannabis products. The program will last 5 years and has significant restrictions : in fact, it is limited only to spasticity associated with multiple sclerosis, discomfort associated with chemotherapy and severe forms of epilepsy refractory to traditional treatment. In these cases, however, cannabis-based medicines are expected to be reimbursed .
France is also preparing to open the doors to the controlled medical use of cannabis, a move that is believed to affect between 30,000 and one million patients suffering from different forms of chronic pain. "There will be at least two years of experimentation with therapeutic cannabis," Professor Nicolas Authier, the chief pharmacologist at the Clermont-Ferrand University Hospital Center, Pain Therapy Center, told French media. Although France will launch its own cultivation centers for this specific phase of experimentation, the cannabis products that will be used at the beginning of this process will most likely be imported from other countries.
In general, reasoning in terms of market growth, judging by the great momentum in the production of cannabis for medical purposes, it will be countries such as Afghanistan, Australia and the countries of South Asia that will experience the most impressive boom in the medical cannabis sector. A business on which we will not fail to report all the developments.
