Recreational marijuana advocates are protesting a few medical marijuana companies that have testified against the current marijauana bill in the state legislature.
Many medical marijuana users are frustrated by the high prices and low supply of the market in Delaware, and are advocating for the legalization of recreational weed in the state to improve their options.
Lillyanne Ternahan is a medical marijuana patient organizing the protests. At one staged in Smyrna last week, she talked about how many of her fellow patients struggle to afford the drug right now, because of the limited supply in the medical marijuana market.
“I’ve watched by best friends grandmother time and time again have to make a choice of whether to make sure that she has groceries and her other things, other medical supplies prior to the cannabis which helps with her nausea and vomiting," Ternahan said.
Ternahan says prices in Delaware can be up to twice as expensive as in states that have legalized the drug for everyone.
Plus, the amount of cultivation facilities would increase ten times under the recreational bill. Ternahan says both recreational and medical users would benefit from decreased prices.
Prices in Delaware are higher than most states with recreational weed, making the drug unaffordable for some.
Stacey Fox is a medical marijuana patient in Dover, who’s registered to lobby on marijuana issues at Leg Hall.
She adds on top of high prices in some dispensaries, supply can also be an issue.
“They hardly ever have the strains that work for us, hardly ever. There’s been times that I’ve asked them specifically, cause I know what terpenes work best for me, so I have asked which terpenes is it — and they did say they could get that for me but they would need at least 24 hours notice," Fox said.
The highest prices for recreational marijuana in the country are in Washington D.C.
Fox says when she visited Massachusetts last October, the difference was astonishing, the prices were lower and the supply was much greater. Massachusetts legalized recreational marijuana back in 2016.
Ternahan says she’s protesting because some of Delaware’s compassion centers want to restrict the recreational market to maintain their market share.
In a statement, these compassion centers say they support recreational marijuana legalization, but have concerns over the new social equity and micro businesses licenses and the rollout of the new program.
This story has been updated to include clarification.
