Every year as summer comes to an end, teams of Canadian military and police officers patrol the skies in helicopters hunting for illegal marijuana grow-ops nestled in farm fields below.
A quick survey of recent headlines around the legalization discussion, even the federal task force’s press conference, reveals a conspicuous absence: medical cannabis and the patients who rely on it.
Canada’s budding marijuana industry doesn’t expect Ottawa to embrace ads for weed on billboards or television screens once new legalization legislation is introduced next spring, according to the president of Canada’s highest-profile pot company.
Ottawa police say they’re “aware” of medical marijuana dispensaries popping up illegally across the city, including one in Vanier that just opened its doors last weekend.