Patients for medical marijuana urge Governor Reeves to call a special session so a program can be implemented.
On Wednesday, Patients for Medical Marijuana held a press conference highlighting several individuals and their desire to have medical marijuana in the state after the Supreme Court struck down Initiative 65. Several patients and loved ones of people who would benefit from medical marijuana explained why Mississippi needs the program.
The speakers urged for Governor Tate Reeves to call special session. This would allow for legislators to address the initiative process and pass Initiative 65 exactly as it was written.
“Those of us who would have qualified as patients were so relieved in November when Mississippi voters overwhelmingly passed Initiative 65,” said Cody Weaver, a disabled veteran with Patients for Medical Marijuana. “Then a few weeks ago, six Mississippi Supreme Court justices took away our hope of finding relief, despite the fact that more than 200,000 Mississippians signed petitions to put Initiative 65 on the ballot and three-fourths of the state’s voters approved it.”
Speakers included Tim Floyd a cancer patient currently in remission, Jim Bright, whose wife passed away from lung cancer, and Bethany Hill, who suffers from 27 medical conditions. Hill even chose to move out of Mississippi until 2018 to be treated with medical marijuana.
Patients for Medical Marijuana said their goal is to show the press and people across the state of Mississippi the patients whose lives would be changed through programs such as Initiative 65.
The program created by Initiative 65 would have gone into effect in August of 2021. If the Legislature does not return and pass a bill that contains the parameters of the program in a special session, they will be faced with that task come the 2022 session which begins in January.
**With contributions from Anne Summerhays**
Sarah Ulmer
