Eighteen years after Alaskans technically gained the right to use medical marijuana, there are still no state-licensed dispensaries and there are only six qualifying illnesses for MMJ use, according to NORML.
In response, several nonprofits have started to deliver free pot to veterans and patients in need.
Some are calling this a pot version of Meals on Wheels, the cannabis army, or the reefer buyer’s club, according to the Daily Beast.
One of them is called the Alaska Green Angels, co-founded by Darby Andrews, and two others.
Green Angels, a Facebook group that delivers pot to “angels in need,” is an interactive group that connects those in need with those that have and want to share.
Andrews cited the lack of dispensaries and lack of doctors willing to prescribe MMJ as roadblocks to patients in need of medical marijuana.
“It’s like [the state] said ‘sure, go ahead, you can have it but you can’t buy it, sell it, or transport it,’” said Andrews. “It’s just supposed to magically appear.”
The premise of Green Angels is simple: post a need for cannabis and one of the group’s 400 members will respond and deliver it, free of charge.
At first, Andrews and the other founders were the primary donors and only catered to a small group they knew personally. But over the course of a year the operation has “taken on a life of its own.”
About 10 people growing cannabis contribute to the group, Andrews explained, while others provide the equipment or raw materials for edibles.
In past years, some Alaskans offered “free” pot, but required a donation until authorities cracked down on accepting money for pot.
The Green Angels have eliminated the issue of monetary exchange.
Dakota Davis, a Navy veteran honorably discharged due to Crohn’s disease, received his first free cannabis from a stranger who responded to his post.
Davis, 26, had never used pot before; he didn’t like the “black market thing,” he told the Alaska Dispatch, until he got connected with the Alaska Green Angels.
“These guys have been helping me out tremendously,” said Davis who uses cannabis to alleviate nausea brought on by chemotherapy he undergoes for Crohn’s. He also uses it in place of opiates, which he said negatively affect his mood.
graphic via vaporizernerd.com
