Product safety isn’t guaranteed even where weed is legal
A Californian’s View of Marijuana Laws and the Importance of State Tests for Biological Diversity and Other Microbes
“You’re not gonna keel over if you buy some cheap suspect weed,” said Mitchell. “But 10 years down the road maybe you develop a lung problem that someone who was smoking cleaner weed won’t.”
He can only go to a dispensary that he trusts and he needs to drive to a place he can trust. That is available to a person with deep knowledge of the industry.
People assume it’s safe due to the fact that the state has guardrails in place. When you look at the end result, I believe that’s up for debate.
Justin Singer makes edible cannabis products in Colorado under the names Ripple and Ript, and over the years, he has become increasingly concerned about the state’s lack of enforcement of the industry and what that means for the safety of the marijuana supply.
Every state with legalized marijuana has its own set of rules. In Massachusetts and Alabama, marijuana authorities require testing for coliform. Colorado does not. If a state tests for the same microbes, they often have different limits. Colorado’s standard for total yeasts and molds is 10 times lower than Michigan’s limits for recreational cannabis flower.
Cannabis Recalls prompted by a Breakdown in the Colorado Marijuana Enforcement Division and it’s Implications to Health and Safety
A breaking point came when Singer released a much cheaper product to the market, and increased sales by 500%, a spike he expected would certainly trigger an inspection from the state Marijuana Enforcement Division.
“The kind of guy who wants an honest playing field,” Singer said. “Professional sports would not be fun if there were no referees and one team was allowed to cheat, while one team tried to follow the rules. It would be very not fun to watch, to participate in.”
Thomas Mitchell reviewed cannabis products for Westword, and is now an editor for the Colorado weekly. He’s written many times on health and safety advisories and recalls. He says it’s a buyer beware market.
“I consider Colorado weed today to be on par with New York street weed in 2008. Singer thinks that the Mexican government cared more about their consumers than people in this area. “I’ve got the data to back it.”
Recalls have grabbed headlines across the country last year. More than 132,000 marijuana products were recalled in Missouri because of non compliant lab testing and tracking. In California, Mike Tyson’s branded cannabis flower products were recalled due to molds. Last year Maine became the first state in the nation to issue a recall of products because of yeast and mold.
There have no widespread reports of people getting sick or dropping dead from using cannabis products despite an estimated $30 billion in sales last year alone. But some in the industry and health and safety experts say the long term ramifications of smoking contaminated weed are not known, and they are urging the state to do more to protect consumers.
As the industry became well established, Colorado’s Marijuana Enforcement Division increased its staff and started to require testing of marijuana for things like heavy metals and yeasts and molds, and set limits for the contaminants. There are health and safety advisories issued by the MED.
If we need to make dog food follow these rules but we don’t need to make cannabis follow them, I don’t know what the industry is doing. I am aware that the industry already feels like it is over regulated.
The director of the Marijuana Enforcement Division would not comment on the data from Singer but said that there was a process in place for ensuring marijuana was free of contaminants.
The need to continue to work on that is something that we see. Ensure that we are reaching consumers effectively, that we are giving them information that they need to decide if they want to use certain products, and that we are identifying products that may pose a threat to health and safety?
She said that in the past few months they have updated the health and safety notice page online, and will soon be sending flyers to educate consumers on safety issues.
Cannabis Safety in Marijuana Legal Recreational States: A Key Issue in Colorado’s Weed Industry and Where Does It Come From?
Mendiola acknowledged that the marijuana industry is suffering, prices for cannabis have crashed after a huge infusion of investment during the pandemic lockdowns when sales were rising quickly. Businesses closing depletes license revenue that supports MED enforcement. She noted that they are downsizing their offices in Lakewood to reduce costs.
“We’ve been, for a few years now, looking at those opportunities to save costs, cut expenses, in a way that still allows us and ensures that we’re able to carry out our regulatory obligations,” said Mendiola.
“I think at this point in Colorado you’re dealing with the safest weed you can have in the United States,” said Ethan Shaw, co-founder of The Flower Collective. “At the end of the day there’s a lot of things Colorado’s learned that other states haven’t learned yet, and one of those, the big one’s, heavy metals.”
Cannabis, Shaw said, is “an extreme bio-accumulator, so it takes up everything that’s in the soil and it stores it in the plant.” Research has identified heavy metal concentrations in smokable products like cigarettes, and cannabis, as a major long-term health concern.
Shaw stated that the rate of recalls has slowed in Colorado after a major increase. The financial struggles of the industry in Colorado leads to fewer producers.
“It’s really difficult to make a judgement on whether it’s right or wrong when there isn’t much data to give you a clear picture of the health impact” said Tess Eidem, senior research scientist at the University of Colorado.
Where are the counterfeiters? Detecting mold and pesticides in a home in Fairfield, California, following a search warrant
What is clear, said Eidem, is that marijuana growers in Colorado and other states are allowed to use irradiation technology to treat their product when it fails testing. The process is approved in food, with required labeling. She said that a grower can hit the cannabis buds with x-ray until it passes testing. The process breaks down the chemical bonds of molds and bacteria, enough for them to die or stop multiplying, according to the EPA.
Currently, what’s required is that products pass a final test. Growers are already suffering a downturn in sales prices so the process can be difficult. Stores and grows are closing.
Shaun Opie, with E4 Bioscience in Michigan, is an expert in marijuana contaminants and lab testing. He said the money put into a harvest means there’s immense pressure to sell it.
Opie said it would be a good idea for states to implement a shelf surveillance testing program, to monitor the product that actually makes it to consumers.
Yountville, Calif. A sergeant was on a warm winter morning last month. Erin McAtee watched as members of his team with the California Department of Cannabis Control executed a search warrant at a home in Fairfield, halfway between Sacramento and San Francisco.
The house on this street looked like one of those upscale suburban houses that were visible from the outside. Inside, the home had been gutted, transformed into a smelly mess of marijuana plants, grow lights, chemicals and pesticides.
“You can see the mold down on the tarp down there,” McAtee said. “Yup, that’s mold.” His team also identified chemicals and pesticides not approved in the U.S. for use with consumer products like legal cannabis.
He told NPR that his undercovers would buy cannabis from people who were pretending to be legit. “They’ll tell you they have a license and that everything they’re doing is legit.”
If it’s hard for experienced cops to distinguish regulated weed from black market products, it can be nearly impossible for average consumers. Marijuana legalization supporters are concerned that unregulated weed plays a big role.
Paul Armentano is the National Organization for the Reform of Marijuana Laws. He said any time a consumer product is being sold without proper regulation, it’s risky.
“Whether I was getting cannabis or alcohol or my broccoli from an entirely unregulated market, I’d be concerned about any number of issues,” Armentano said.
NPR asked about the role of organized crime in China in the U.S. cannabis industry, but didn’t hear back. In the past, Beijing has suggested the U.S. is pointing fingers at China to divert attention from America’s drug and crime problems.
Chinese criminal groups use illegal cannabis plantations as a way to funnel money into the United States, while human traffickers go through some of those networks to bring people into the country. She said that they end up being enslaved at the plantations.
The repeal of alcohol prohibition in 1933 left many states with liquor bans that stayed on the books until the 1950s. Liquor bootleggers and smugglers continued to operate for years.
Many states have mismanaged this transition by focusing too much on regulating weed companies without helping them compete with criminal organizations.
“After [states] pass legalization, they’ll spend a couple of years coming up with the licensing regime and figuring out what the regulations are going to be and issuing licenses, but there hasn’t been a lot of focus on what to do about the illegal market. In many places, enforcement has not been a priority.
In Fairfield, Sgt. A truck backed up and prepared to take away a large amount of seized cannabis from an illegal grow house. He said this crop might have wound up on shelves anywhere in the U.S.
He said that cannabis can be exported to other states where the profit is ten times greater than in California.
A US-based edible marijuana manufacturer, Justin Singer, has said that he became concerned about the state’s lack of enforcement of the industry after he released a much cheaper product to the market and increased sales by 500%. As the industry became well established, Colorado’s Marijuana Enforcement Division began to require testing of marijuana for things like heavy metals and yeasts and molds.