A brief analysis of the Czech cannabis market

The bottleneck of any medicine made on the basis of the therapeutic properties of hemp is its high price (patent value) . The initiative of the Ministry of Health to reimburse the cost of using hemp from the state budget will clearly increase the number of patients using the medicinal properties of the plant for treatment .

Despite the significant period of time the medical cannabis market has existed in the Czech Republic , it is still in its infancy. The information of experts suggests that in 2018 the total market size did not exceed € 40 thousand. 

Act No. 50/2013 Coll1, which regulated the use of hemp for medical purposes, entered into force in 2013. At that time, only a few patients in the country as an exception received the opportunity to use the therapeutic properties of hemp for the treatment of a number of diseases . The situation partially changed in 2015 thanks to Decree No. 236/2015 Coll2, which sets out the conditions under which medical cannabis can be prescribed by doctors and legally sold in the country . In order to comply with the UN Drug Control Convention, the State Agency for Medical Cannabis (Státní agentury pro konopí pro lécebné pouzití, SAKL) was established, which issues licenses for the legal cultivation of medical cannabis , as well as the acquisition and distribution of grown crops , the import of hemp green mass plants , has a significant therapeutic properties .

Despite the fact that the possibility of using hemp for medical purposes in the Czech Republic is one of the first in the world , this market has not yet achieved any impressive results - pharmacies in the country sold less than 5 kilograms of hemp in 2018 . The country has a small domestic cultivation and allows import (from 4.8 kg of leaves and inflorescences sold, 1.8 kg was grown by a local company and 3 kg were imported). 

Part of leaves and inflorescences of legal medical cannabis produced within the country by Elkoplast Slušovice, sro, but there is the possibility of import hemp raw material from the Netherlands and Canada . Elkoplast Slušovice sells its products to the State Institute for Drug Control. All products are stocked by a single authorized distributor, Alliance Healthcare sro.

Czech cannabis market statistical analysis

* Cannabis for medical use supplied from abroad can be issued in all pharmacies in the Czech Republic . Grown in the Czech Republic can only be sold in pharmacies with which contracts are concluded with SAKL, and patients are allowed to purchase leaves and inflorescences exclusively in these pharmacies.

The volume of cannabis consumption for medical purposes in the Czech Republic (in grams)

Despite the fact that the total sales volume of medical hemp in the Czech Republic in 2018 amounted to less than 5 kilograms, several Canadian companies producing hemp raw materials with significant therapeutic properties tried to focus on entering the Czech hemp market :

• Tilray announced its first export to the Czech Republic in December 2017;

• Canopy Growth acquired the Czech importer in April 2018;

 • Aurora Cannabis announced its first shipment to the Czech Republic in November 2018.

Until recently, state medical insurance did not cover hemp , but in 2018 the Ministry of Health of the country proposed to change the situation and repay up to 90% of the cost of pharmacological preparations made on the basis of the therapeutic properties of hemp . The idea of ​​reimbursement from the state budget for the cost of hemp-based pharmaceuticals will be implemented starting in 2020.

As of March 2019 80 doctors in the country with a population of over 10 million people have been included in the list of persons, designating a medical cannabis . Decree 236/2015 established the following list of diseases that can only be prescribed by certain medical specialists (these diseases must be accompanied by chronic pain):

• Clinical oncology ;

• Radiation oncology ;

• Neurology;

• Palliative medicine;

• Pain treatment;

• Rheumatology;

• Orthopedics;

• Infectious diseases;

• Medicine of internal organs;

• Ophthalmology;

• Dermatovenerology;

• Geriatrics

Commentary experts of the Association " Ukrainian industrial hemp "

As has been pointed out more than once, the  bottleneck of any medicine made on the basis of the therapeutic properties of hemp is its high price (patent value) . The initiative of the Ministry of Health to reimburse expenses for the use of medical hemp from the state budget will clearly increase the number of patients using the medicinal properties of the plant for treatment  (you can see a sharp increase in the number of doctors and drugstores who received permission to work with medical hemp immediately after such statements by government officials). Until the cost of pharmacological preparations made on the basis of the therapeutic properties of hemp was compensated , exactly the same picture of a small number of people wishing to use expensive drugs was observed and is observed in several other EU countries . The moment of rapid growth in the consumption of pharmacological preparations based on the therapeutic properties of hemp is observed exactly when the state budget takes on the burden of compensating for their cost.

After the entry into force of the compensation mechanism for the cost of medicines manufactured using the therapeutic properties of hemp , approximately the same number of medical hemp was sold in the Czech Republic in the first four months of 2020 as it was sold for the whole of 2019.