New Mexico will now also treat outside patients

A state district judge's decision will allow hundreds of patients to reauthorize themselves to participate in New Mexico's medical marijuana program.

It was a mandate issued last September that was challenged and resulted in a subsequent emergency settlement just weeks later, which was passed by the state health department just weeks later and placed additional requirements on some patients with medical marijuana cards from other states. Ultra Health, New Mexico's largest cannabis company, asked the court to intervene on the grounds that the agency was exceeding the intent of the state legislature and creating more barriers for patients seeking mutual admission into the New Mexico program.

Judge Matthew Wilson said the agency's justification for adopting the emergency settlement in early October was insufficient and therefore unenforceable. "It's important to patients who have already been on the program and have been taken away and to patients in need of access.

That was their only hope," said a patient advocate. David Morgan, a health department spokesman, said the agency was sticking to the decision and that any 323 people affected by the decision could buy from licensed cannabis suppliers in the state again. The number of active patients in New Mexico's medical marijuana program is over 98,500.

There are approximately 1,700 mutual participants. Recreational marijuana legalization in the state will be re-discussed during the next legislature in January.