(Bloomberg) -- New Jersey has doubled the number of medical marijuana patients to 34,000 since Governor Phil Murphy took office.
“Over the past three months alone, the program has added 9,000 patients,” said health commissioner Shereef Elnahal, in a statement on Monday.
Of the 17,000 new patients who have signed up since January, a majority have one of the five new conditions added at the end of March, including anxiety and migraines.
Other changes under Murphy, a first-term Democrat, have cut the wait time for identification cards to an average of two weeks, allowed caregivers for terminally ill patients to get provisional cards while waiting for background checks, and streamlined the application process.
The department is also considering adding opioid use disorder as a qualifying condition. Currently, opioid use disorder has to be associated with chronic pain due to musculoskeletal disorders to qualify.
To contact the reporter on this story: Lara Wieczezynski in Princeton at wieczezynski@bloomberg.net
To contact the editors responsible for this story: Flynn McRoberts at fmcroberts1@bloomberg.net, Stacie Sherman
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