The Peruvian Congress approved by majority on 20th of October a law that regulates the medicinal and therapeutic use of cannabis and its derivatives. The draft law obtained 67 votes in favor, 5 against and 3 abstentions, so it is expected that President Pedro Pablo Kuczynski will enact it within the next days.

For making medicinal use of cannabis viable, the norm stipulates that the Ministry of Health has to create several official records, one of them, of reserved nature, should be for patients certified by their doctor and should contain information about the disease and the recommended dose.

Furthermore, the ministry must open an official registry for natural or legal persons, importers or marketers; another one for entities and laboratories authorized to produce; and, finally, a list of entities dedicated to the investigation of cannabis and its derivatives for medicinal and therapeutic purposes.

Although the approved bill does not contemplate cultivation and associative cultivation, it takes an important step in the legal framework for medicinal use, which includes production and research, and the registration of patients and doctors.

This new law will be very valuable for the more than 100,000 Peruvians whose quality of life depends on the use of cannabis oil, such as cancer patients, epilepsy or Parkinson's, among other terminal illnesses and chronic diseases.