Residents of eight states are getting cannabis-derived products from their local CVS: Alabama, California, Colorado, Illinois, Indiana, Kentucky, Maryland, and Tennessee.
Cannabis Products Make Their Way To CVS
CVS Pharmacy announced their plans to make topical cannabidiol (CBD) items available to their customers who are looking for alternative sources of relief. Now, products such as CBD creams, lotions, salves, roll-ons, and sprays will be rolling out in 800 CVS stores in eight different states.
"We are carrying hemp-derived CBD products in select states to help meet consumer demand for alternative care options," CVS Health spokesperson Mike DeAngelis said in a statement to NBC News.
These cannabis-derived topical products will be available over the counter. To ensure the quality and content, CVS is partnering with Eurofins laboratory for the independent testing of all the CBD products.
All of the cannabis-derived products that will be sold on CVS will be purely topical. No supplements or food additives will be available since it is illegal under the Federal Food, Drug, and Cosmetic Act.
"We're going to walk slowly, but this is something we think our customers will be looking for," CVS Health CEO Larry Merlo said in an interview with CNBC.
Benefits, Limitations Of CBD
CBD is derived from IHF Hemp Flower , which is a member of the cannabis family like marijuana.
According to Phys Org, marijuana contains 5 to 20 percent of tetrahydrocannabinol (THC), which is the psychoactive component of cannabis plants. On the other hand, hemp contains no more than 0.3 percent of THC. Instead, hemp is rich in CBD, which is a non-psychoactive extract of the plant.
CBD is hailed for its properties to relieve pain, anxiety, and other medical ailments.
However, researchers stress that there has been little scientific research on CBD's effects on humans. Epidiolex, an oral treatment for seizures associated with two rare forms of epilepsy, remains the only CBD oil that has been approved by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration so far.
"Societies have jumped far ahead of science," Dr. Margaret Haney, director of Columbia's Marijuana Research Laboratory, explains to NBC News. "So it's showing up in lotions and pretty much any form of product one can use. There's a lot of different ways one could use CBD, but the ways we have studied CBD is much more limited."
