The New York Times reports:
A standoff between Gov. Chris Christie of New Jersey and advocates for medical marijuana has ended in a compromise that could put marijuana on the market for seriously ill patients by next summer.
The new regulations, announced on Friday, would provide for six growing and distribution sites for medical marijuana in various parts of the state. The governor had wanted to limit the number of growers to two and distribution sites to four.
But among the states that allow it, New Jersey would become the only one to limit the amount of psychotropic chemical permitted in the marijuana.
While the Christie administration had pushed to require qualifying patients to exhaust all other treatments before receiving medical marijuana, the compromise applies that restriction to only three nonfatal conditions: seizures, glaucoma and intractable muscle spasms.
Mr. Christie hailed the compromise as “the best way to move forward on a responsible, medically based program that will avoid the significant fraud and criminal diversion that other states have experienced.”
Gov. Jon S. Corzine signed New Jersey’s medical marijuana law as he was leaving office in January, making New Jersey the 14th state to legalize the treatment. New York and Connecticut have not.
Since then, Mr. Christie, who was skeptical of the legalization, has been haggling with lawmakers and advocates over the particulars of how to carry out the law.
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