Changes in health harms due to cannabis following legalisation of non‐medical cannabis in Canada in context of cannabis commercialisation: A scoping review
Daniel T. Myran, Sameer Imtiaz, Lauren Konikoff, Laura Douglas, Tara Elton‐Marshall
Abstract
ISSUE: On 17 October 2018, Canada legalised non-medical cannabis. Critically, the cannabis market in Canada has changed considerably since legalisation. In this scoping review, we identified available evidence on changes in cannabis-related health harms following legalisation and contextualised findings based on legal market indicators. APPROACH: Electronic searches were conducted to identify studies that compared changes in cannabis-related health harms pre- and post-legalisation. We contextualised each study by the mean per capita legal cannabis stores and sales during the study period and compared study means to per capita stores and sales on October 2021-3 years following legalisation. IMPLICATIONS AND CONCLUSIONS: Some measures of cannabis harms have increased since legalisation but studies to date have captured periods of relatively low market maturity. Longer-term monitoring of health harms as the market continues to expand is indicated.