While opioid pain relievers offer critical benefits to certain patients, such as those with cancer-related pain, the rise of opioid prescriptions has had devastating public health consequences. The C.D.C. recently urged physicians to be very cautious in prescribing these drugs.

Meanwhile, access to medical marijuana has expanded rapidly — 24 states and D.C. have legalized its broad medical use — and chronic or severe pain is the most common condition reported among those using it. On it's face, this might seem to mirror the rise in prescription opioid use.

Is The Farm, with its earnest salespeople and eager shoppers, a vision of pot's future here?

Just 10 minutes before its 9 a.m. opening time, a dozen mellow shoppers have already lined up outside The Farm Saturday in Boulder, Colorado.

Curious, I join the line and ask about the commercial commotion.

A middle-class dude replied that The Farm was offering a 20-per-cent discount on cannabis products in honour of the late Prince that morning.

It was a "Purple Haze" sale, he said.

Others in line volunteered that the state's new marijuana stores were "awesome" and the marijuana trade thriving.

Hemp has exactly the same potential as cannabis.

• Same CBD content
• Yet, no need for a prescription
• And no psychoactive reaction

The only difference between hemp and cannabis is the THC content of above 0.3% in cannabis which leads to a psychoactive reaction – as THC is the only psychoactive component. Hemp THC content has to be below 0.3%.

• Same health benefits (same medicinal and nutritional effects)
• Much easier accessible for consumers (no prescription and legality issues)
• You can work and drive ect. (non-psychoactive)

Properties of CBD are amongst others:

The clock could be running out this year for activists urging the Iowa Legislature to approve expanded access to medical marijuana.

Iowa Senate Majority Leader Michael Gronstal, D-Council Bluffs, told reporters Tuesday he is keeping the door open for medical cannabis legislation, but his goal is to have the Senate adjourn its 2016 session this week. He spoke one day after the Iowa House defeated a Republican-backed bill aimed at helping Iowans with debilitating diseases access cannabis oil in Minnesota and other states and bring it back to Iowa.

Marijuana's official designation as a Schedule 1 drug — something with "no accepted medical use" — means it is pretty tough to study.

Yet numerous anecdotal reports as well as some studies have linked marijuana with several purported health benefits, from pain relief to helping with certain forms of epilepsy.

Still, experts say more rigorous scientific analyses are needed. Use of marijuana, a psychoactive drug, can come with risks, especially in people who may be prone to addiction or mental illness. Take a look at how marijuana can affect your brain and body: 

A roundup of various movement in cannabis legalization in Europe.

While in the Americas in the last few years we have seen several waves of liberal reforms in countries like the USA, Canada, Chile, and Uruguay, we rarely hear similar news concerning European countries. But cannabis legalization is also winning support slowly in European countries other than the Netherlands Spain and Portugal.

In the UK last month, Liberal Democrat MP Norman Lamb raised a bill for decriminalization of cannabis – a second hearing will take place on May.

Public Health Director James Gillan says the rules and regs hit a snag with the Economic Impact Statement.

This next November election will mark two years since the initiative to implement medical marijuana on Guam was passed and now another holdup in the much-anticipated final draft rules and regulations.

A Vancouver pot shop entrepreneur says he’s in a real dilemma, as one of his locations is in the final stages of approval, while the other is facing closure.

Chuck Varabioff, owner of the BC Pain Society, says his Commercial Drive location was rejected because it’s within 300m of a school, but he’s vowing to stay open come Friday.

“If the city wants to come in, they want to come with a fine, I will be standing at the door with a post-dated cheque to pay my fines for an entire month if that’s what they want.”

“I’m not happy to pay the fines but I will pay the fines while I’m fighting and appealing for your right as well as my right as well as 15,000 other people’s rights who are members.”

An attempt in the Iowa Legislature to expand medical marijuana access in the state may have reached its end this session with a failed vote in the Republican-controlled House, though some Democrats said Tuesday they would keep pushing the issue in the days before a possible adjournment.

Both Republicans and Democrats in the chamber pointed fingers at each other following a Monday night debate that ultimately shot down a plan that critics said would not have done enough to expand the state’s medical marijuana law, which allows the use of cannabis oil for certain epilepsy patients.

Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton doesn’t have a firm stance on marijuana legalization yet — she wants to see more research first. But there are some challenges to getting that research, she said.

At an ABC town hall April 21, Clinton told audience member Evan Nison, a National Organization for the Reform of Marijuana Laws board member, what she would do as president to address the marijuana legalization debate.