Georgia just rewrote its medical marijuana rules — no more THC cap, vaping's in

Georgia's medical cannabis program changed shape on July 1, when SB 220 — signed by Governor Brian Kemp in May — took effect. The law scraps the old 5% THC potency cap that had defined Georgia's program since it launched and replaces it with a possession limit instead: 12,000 milligrams of medical cannabis total, with individual packages generally capped at 1,200 milligrams of THC.

Delivery methods expanded too. Patients could previously only get oils, tinctures, capsules, lozenges, topicals, and transdermal patches; vaping is now a legal option for patients 21 and older. Georgia is also retiring the "Low THC Oil" label entirely in favor of "Medical Marijuana," a naming change that matters less for patients than for how the program gets talked about going forward.

Four new conditions now qualify for a card — lupus, intractable pain, severe insomnia, and inflammatory bowel disease — and the law drops the "severe or end-stage" documentation requirement for cancer, Parkinson's disease, Stage III HIV, Alzheimer's disease, and multiple sclerosis. Patients with those diagnoses no longer have to wait for the disease to get as bad as possible before they can register.

It's a limited-market law — Georgia's program remains far more restrictive than any recreational state's — but the direction matches a pattern showing up elsewhere this year: potency caps giving way to possession limits, and delivery methods loosening even in conservative-leaning legislatures. Worth watching if you operate in adjacent Southern states, where lawmakers tend to copy whatever the neighboring state just got away with.