• Among those older than 25, cannabis is associated with only 11% of substance-use-related ER visits, while alcohol is associated with 58% of such visits.
• A majority (69%) of all substance-use-related hospitalizations required mental health care. Among cannabis-related hospitalizations, 81% involved mental health care, compared with 49% of those with opioid-related hospitalizations.
• Alberta youths were hospitalized for reasons related to substance use more than those of other provinces. CBC Calgary

Quick Hits

1. Quebec’s CAQ government will not require renters to show landlords their MED prescriptions to prove they use cannabis for medical reasons, leaving it up to provincial housing authorities to decide on whether renters involved in a dispute with landlords need to prove their medical need.
   Ici Radio-Canada—In French
2. Canopy‘s Ontario hometown of Smiths Falls hopes to reframe itself as Canada’s REC tourism destination, except no one in the town of 9,000 can legally sell you any weed.
   Leafly

• Thefts are occurring all over, aided by the strong smell of flowering plants.
  Windsor Star
• The good news is plant thefts are covered under home insurance, with coverage depending on the company. In London, Ontario, police even managed to return stolen plants to their rightful owner after the thief dropped a backpack containing his ID.
  CBC London

• Growing outdoors in a residential neighbourhood has other risks: Canadians for Fair Access to Medical Marijuana’s Dan Goulet reported his plants were pollinated by neighbours who didn’t recognize male plants. Goulet said, “Growing outdoor in Canadian suburbs in 2009 seems to be yielding similar results as growing outdoor in Canadian suburbs in 1975.”
  Twitter

Quick Hits

1. Cannabis aquaponics (growing in water used in fish farming) is still in early days—after only two LPs have received aquaponics licenses, Habitat Craft Cannabis became Canada’s first craft aquaponics licensee.
   NewsWire
2. Hemp growers in PEI are asking Ottawa to be allowed to grow high-CBD hemp plants, which they say would make them competitive with US counterparts.
   CBC PEI

• The platform promises to lower the non-existent “federally set price for cannabis,” to eliminate non-existent “requirements for excess plastic packaging,” and to “allow outdoor production” (licensed outdoor LP growing began in June and more than a dozen LPs are now licensed to grow outdoors).
  CTV News
• A Green government would also “impose organic production standards,” a move BC Independent Cannabis Association President Courtland Sandover-Sly said “would devastate the industry.”
  Twitter

Quick Hits

1. CBD LP Eureka 93‘s entire leadership team resigned following an Ontario Securities Commission cease-trade order on the company’s stock early this month. In good news, the company just got a new greenhouse license.
   Globe and Mail
2. The Toronto Stock Exchange debuted the TSX30, recognizing the 30 best-performing stocks over a three-year period. Canopy came in first, and there are four cannabis companies in the top 10.
   TMX

• Industry people trust Health Canada’s strict regulations will protect the Canadian public, though La resse discovered that a Canadian company applied for a patent on vitamin E as a viscosity agent for cannabis vaping liquid—the same chemical connected with many or most U.S. vape illnesses.
  Bloomberg, La Presse—In French
• A coalition of several medical groups called on Ottawa to subject vape products to the same strict limits on advertising and flavouring as tobacco.
  CBC Health
• Rumours are circulating that Health Canada may delay legalizing vape devices until after October 17, but there’s little to suggest this is true. One insider suggested the real challenge for manufacturers will be due diligence that their hardware does not allow metal leeching. Twitter—Matthew Greenberg, Aaron W. Anderson

Quick Hits

1. The Canadian Centre for Substance Use and Addiction launched its searchable Canadian Cannabis Research Database, charting cannabis research under 40 topic headings.
2. Aphria launched a program for parents to discuss cannabis use with their children. They partnered with Drug Free Kids Canada, an organization with which Health Canada severed ties in November after learning it was founded by a donation from opioid company Purdue Pharma.
   Winsor Star, Hill Times

• Alberta REC retailer Ryan Roch tweeted “Articles like this show me most retail CEOs have a lack of understanding on the industry […] We easily moved product from slow moving brands when we used traditional strain names and abandoned ‘brand’ names.”
• Roderick C. Elliot, of public policy consultancy Global Public Affairs, noted, “Nobody has a clue about brands unless they are buying stocks.” Twitter

• The Ontario Cannabis Retail Corporation owns crown online REC retailer the Ontario Cannabis Store and funnels all REC through its provincial wholesale warehouse.
• The motivation for the change is the threat that after legalization 2.0, there will be so many new products the provincial warehouse will not have space to stock them.
• Lawyer Trina Fraser praised the idea, saying, “There is no reason for a provincial distributor. The integrity of the supply chain can be maintained without product sitting on the shelf of a warehouse in Oakville for god knows how long.”

• The judges will explain their ruling within 10 days.
• The 11 disqualified lottery winners argued they did not receive news of their wins quickly enough to give them time to file their paperwork. Judges apparently agreed with lawyers for the Alcohol and Gaming Commission of Ontario’s claim that applicants were responsible for making sure they’ve given the correct email address.
  CBC Toronto
• Toronto lawyer Caryma Sa’d posted several informative threads before and during the hearing explaining the issues in exhaustive detail.
  Twitter

• US stock-research firm MKM Partners cautiously initiated coverage of five Canadian LPs, rating Aurora “sell” due to flagging profitability, which they expect will improve. The company rated Canopy, Tilray, and Cronos “neutral” and gave Hexo a “buy” rating. MarketWatch

• Cannalyst author Craig Wiggins warned “Canada is legally harvesting at 81% of TOTAL Projected Cdn Cannabis demand” leaving “an 892-day supply glut of existing inventory” and a coming wave of bankruptcies, which will leave behind them “inventory of varying quality.”
  Twitter—TheCannalysts

• CCO Cam Battley said the loss “shouldn’t have happened,” but stressed it was not related to core cannabis revenues. He named the lack of retail stores as a major challenge.
  CTV News
• Reflecting on the loss, Battley said if there’s a “rollout of additional retail outlets in Canada and a successful rollout by Health Canada with regards to the derivative market,” Aurora could hit profitability by the second half of this fiscal year.
  Bloomberg
• Aurora’s sales are increasing, with net revenue up 52% quarter over quarter and sales volume nearly doubled.
  Financial Post

• The company also closed a new $200M loan deal led by the Bank of Montreal.
  MJ Biz Daily

Quick Hits

1. 48North co-CEO Jeannette VanderMarel, who also co-founded the Green Organic Dutchman, stepped down from her position for personal reasons, and will stay on as a board director.
   Globe and Mail
2. Both Aurora and Canopy Growth have developed secret formulas to predict when the US will either legalize REC or allow states to legalize.
   MarketWatch

• SheCann founder Ashleigh Brown made a Twitter thread detailing her difficulty affording medication that keeps her from having daily seizures and called for MED taxes to be removed.
  Twitter—Ashleigh Brown
• Canopy MED brand Spectrum Therapeutics partnered with Montreal MED organization Santé Cannabis to develop a free “prescriber training program” to give up-to-date MED information to physicians.
  CityNews, Newswire

Quick Hits

1. The Canadian Medical Association called for Ottawa to lower the maximum 10mg THC to 5mg per discrete edible or package of edibles.
   Calgary Herald
2. You too can get a microcultivation license for “comfortably under $15k” (providing you already own a property on which there’s a suitable standalone building).
   Reddit