Roie Zerahia joins us to share the background of Canndoc in Israel as one of the first companies licensed to grow, process, and distribute cannabis. Now launching in Illinois, they bring with them extensive scientific knowledge about the hundreds of individual compounds in medical cannabis with unique effects that extend beyond those of just THC and CBD.
Seth Addler: Roei Zerahia joins us. Welcome to Cannabis Economy, I'm your host Seth Addler. Download episodes on canneconomy.com. That's two 'N's and the word economy. First, a word from Nancy Whiteman in Wana Brands and then Roei Zerahia.
Speaker 2: [inaudible 00:00:17] Wana Brands. Nancy, state expansion.
Nancy Whiteman: Yes.
Speaker 2: Into Illinois specifically.
Nancy Whiteman: Yes we are in the process of launching in Illinois. Very interesting state. Enormous population, as you know. It's completely medical at this point in time but the thing that's encouraging about it is that they keep adding new [inaudible 00:00:35] conditions to the mix. So the patient population is growing quite nicely.
Speaker 2: Yeah that patient count keeps going up.
Nancy Whiteman: It keeps going up. Yep. So we think long-term it's gonna be an excellent state for us.
Roei Zaharia: Roei Zaharia.
Seth Addler: Excellent. Roei, it's a pleasure to be speaking with you. We have met in person and unfortunately for me, I'm not in Israel with you. I'm here in New York but it's good to get back on the line with you. And as we make our way here into 2019, there are new and different things afoot. Aren't there? So if you could just set the stage for us, as far as what your focused on and what you're working on and then we'll kind of maybe unpack that.
Roei Zaharia: Sure. Let me share with you. First thing, who exactly are the people in CANNDOC and what CANNDOC has been doing in the last decade? Not many people know around the globe that Israel was one of the first places that started a medical program in 2008 and CANNDOC was one of the first three Alpian that got the license to grow, process, and distribute medical cannabis. In Israel, since 2008, medical cannabis was allowed to be distributed to patients but in order to do so, the patient needed to get a license. Not a prescription, a license. This is a very unique method that the minister [inaudible 00:02:24] and decided to doing ordered to start. We are talking about, you know, 2019 today. 11 years ago to start to see how medical cannabis can influence Israeli patients that in some patients the provincial Pharm award did not find a good solution. So starting in 2008, our founders started to grow medical Cannabis and for almost 18 months, did it from their own money and gave it for free to a patient that got a license from the minister of [inaudible 00:03:10].
In 2010, there were already eight LPs in Israel. By the way, those still eight, exist still today and also today in 2019, there are only eight LPs in Israel. And in 2010 and going back, the minister of health decided to take this pileup and convert it to a national program. Which means that a patient will be able to get medical cannabis directly to his home by getting the license from an Israeli's position, there were eight teams physicians at the beginning and the number increased to 36 last year. Those 36 physicians are able to get to a point when after checking and making sure a patient qualifies to the minister of health's qualification, they are allowed to give this patient a license to use medical cannabis on a monthly basis. And those physicians, under those licenses, tell us the LPs re-allow you to supply; to distribute medical cannabis to a patient. And you can speak directly to the patient; ask what are the patient's problems? What exactly they are suffering from? And you do the mix and match in order to understand exactly what is the best Cannabinol profile that can help this specific patient.
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