Medical Marijuana Companies Use Israel As Testing Ground
A woman weighs marijuana buds at the second-largest medical cannabis farm in Israel, in Kfar Pines. Image by Getty
By Ari Feldman August 25, 2017
Israel is becoming a center of American medical marijuana production and research, as U.S. companies move their grow houses and R&D operations to the Jewish State. It is much easier to conduct medical trials on drugs made from cannabis in Israel than it is in the U.S., where companies must spend several years getting approval from federal agencies to even do basic research on marijuana.
“The seriousness with which the Israeli scientific community approaches this is incomparable,” Charles Pollack, director of the Lambert Center for the Study of Medicinal Cannabis at Thomas Jefferson University in Philadelphia, told Rolling Stone. “Israel is a hotbed of quality cannabis research.”
Over 50 American companies currently have medical marijuana R&D operations running in Israel, and 2016 saw over $125 million of investment from U.S. companies in Israeli cannabis operations. One Israeli firm specializing in cannabis R&D expects total investment in Israeli cannabis companies to reach $1 billion over the next ten years.
Israel’s government invests millions of dollars annually into medical marijuana research. American companies often choose Israel as the place to run the early stages of their clinical trials for medical marijuana-based drugs because those same trials would almost certainly be rejected by the FDA.
Even the National Institutes of Health funds hundreds of thousands of dollars worth of medical marijuana research in Israel each year.
Contact Ari Feldman at [email protected] or on Twitter @aefeldman.
I hope you appreciated this article. Before you go, I’d like to ask you to please support the Forward’s award-winning journalism this Passover.
In this age of misinformation, our work is needed like never before. We report on the news that matters most to American Jews, driven by truth, not ideology.
At a time when newsrooms are closing or cutting back, the Forward has removed its paywall. That means for the first time in our 126-year history, Forward journalism is free to everyone, everywhere. With an ongoing war, rising antisemitism, and a flood of disinformation that may affect the upcoming election, we believe that free and open access to Jewish journalism is imperative.
Readers like you make it all possible. Right now, we’re in the middle of our Passover Pledge Drive and we need 500 people to step up and make a gift to sustain our trustworthy, independent journalism.
Make a gift of any size and become a Forward member today. You’ll support our mission to tell the American Jewish story fully and fairly.
— Rachel Fishman Feddersen, Publisher and CEO
Join our mission to tell the Jewish story fully and fairly.
Our Goal: 500 gifts during our Passover Pledge Drive!
