We want patients and families to hear this first: Connecticut’s medical cannabis program is safe, tightly regulated, and designed to protect people who rely on it.
Every product in the legal market is tracked, tested, and verified before it reaches a shelf. By contrast, the illegal market offers none of those protections. If safety is the goal, the regulated system is the only place that guarantees it.
Connecticut set one of the highest bars in the region when it built this program. Licensed producers operate under strict quality rules. Every lot is tested before sale. Dispensaries are run by pharmacists who counsel patients and watch for interactions. That structure has served this state well for more than a decade.
Recent media coverage has created confusion by implying that “clean” cannabis often means cannabis that was “zapped” to fix contamination. That framing is misleading. Prevention comes first in Connecticut. Facilities are designed to stay clean, teams are trained, and processes are validated so products meet standards from the start.
When prevention is not enough, a second layer of protection exists to keep patients safe. That layer is remediation.
Remediation is a common, science-based safety step used across food and medicine. Milk is pasteurized. Spices and herbs are treated to reduce microbes that occur naturally in agriculture. Similar principles apply in cannabis. If a batch does not meet a limit, it is held back, corrected with an approved method, and retested. If it still does not meet every specification, it does not go to patients. That is not a loophole. It is how modern safety programs work.
Patients also deserve to know how often remediation is used. It is not the norm. It is a tool for exceptions. The baseline in licensed facilities is prevention and process control. When remediation is used, it must be validated and the finished product must pass all tests before release. That is the law and the practice in Connecticut.
Transparency helps people trust what they buy. We support clear, public guidance from the Department of Consumer Protection that explains which remediation methods are acceptable, how they are validated, and what post-process testing must show. We support easy access to Certificates of Analysis through QR codes on labels so patients can see that a lot met every limit at the time of sale. We also support ongoing roundtables with patients, clinicians, laboratories, producers, and regulators to keep standards strong and communication clear.
The illegal market is not a safe alternative. It does not test every lot. It does not label or track products. It does not offer pharmacist counseling or recall systems. Counterfeit vapes and unlabeled edibles from unregulated sources are the real risk. Directing patients away from the regulated market by sowing doubt through incomplete or technical claims increases harm, not safety.
Our message is simple. Connecticut cannabis is incredibly safe because prevention, testing, and accountability are built into the legal system. Remediation is a responsible backstop used when necessary to ensure products meet strict limits before sale, just as it is for common foods and medicines. Patients should feel confident that what they purchase in a licensed dispensary has been produced and verified under some of the toughest rules in our region.
We welcome honest debate and better public education. We also ask that commentary avoid leaving the impression that routine safety tools are shortcuts. Patients deserve clarity, not confusion. The best way to protect them is to keep strengthening the safeguards that already work: clean facilities, rigorous testing, pharmacist oversight, transparent information, and a regulated market that puts health first.
Nikole Burnes is Executive Director of the Connecticut Cannabis Chamber of Commerce.