As of Tuesday, there were 1,154 patients certified to use marijuana for medicinal purposes in Connecticut, according to the state Department of Consumer Protection.

Of those, 365 live in New Haven County, 281 live in Fairfield County, and 222 live in Hartford County. Tolland County has 28 patients, the fewest of any county.

The infrastructure for supplying the drug to certified patients is still being established. The Department of Consumer Protection, which oversees the state’s medical marijuana program, is accepting applications from groups that want to produce the drug or operate dispensaries. The deadline is Nov. 15.

As of Oct. 1, no one had applied to operate a dispensary, and as of Oct. 10, no one had applied to be a producer, according to the department. The department isn’t expecting many — or any — applications to be submitted in advance of the deadline, since the field is competitive and the application is comprehensive.

Avatar photo

Arielle Levin Becker covered health care for The Connecticut Mirror. She previously worked for The Hartford Courant, most recently as its health reporter, and has also covered small towns, courts and education in Connecticut and New Jersey. She was a finalist in 2009 for the prestigious Livingston Award for Young Journalists, a recipient of a Knight Science Journalism Fellowship and the third-place winner in 2013 for an in-depth piece on caregivers from the National Association of Health Journalists. She is a 2004 graduate of Yale University.

Leave a comment