Health Canada has significantly expanded its medical marijuana manual for health-care professionals, adding major new sections about the potential adverse effects on the teenaged brain and driving safety.

The document is much larger than the previous 2013 edition, and responds to doctors' complaints about having too little information on the medical science even as they're being asked to authorize marijuana for a growing number of patients.

On March 24, 2016, Health Minister Jane Philpott released a statement announcing that the government will not appeal a Federal Court ruling in Allard that found that the Marihuana for Medical Purposes Regulations (“MMPR”) regime, made pursuant to the Controlled Drugs and Substances Act, infringes section 7 Charter rights to liberty and security by unjustifiably restricting access to medical marijuana. The Court found that, under the single source system of a licensed producer, there is no guarantee that required marijuana will be available when needed at an acceptable price level due to the MMPR structure and market characteristics.

The province of Ontario introduced legislation in 2015 to control the growing e-cigarette market with Bill 45, called the Making Healthier Choices Act.

As reported, the legislation had originally intended to exempt medicinal marijuana patients from the legislation, but that decision was quickly reversed amid what was no doubt a public outcry over the possibility of second-hand exposure.

An association that represents individual pharmacists has changed its stance on medical cannabis, saying pharmacists should play a "front-line" role in dispensing the drug.

The Canadian Pharmacists Association says it has updated its position because it's growing concerned about what it calls a "lack of clinical oversight" in the use of medical marijuana.

The group says in a release issued Thursday that pharmacists are "medication experts" and therefore could help identify potential problems such as drug interactions, contraindications and potentially addictive behaviour.

However, licensed cannabis producers say they don't think that pharmacies should be the only way for patients to access medical marijuana.

Vancouver-based pot activist Dana Larsen vows to push ahead with his pro-legalization rallies and tour despite being arrested and charged in Calgary this week for distributing marijuana seeds.

“It’s absolutely fuelling the fire,” he said Thursday. “I’m getting more requests for seeds and have more people contacting me to donate seeds — so really, this kind of harassment just gets people worked up and gets way more media attention.”

Larsen, 44, was arrested Wednesday evening in Calgary during the second stop of his cross-country OverGrow Canada tour.

One day before WeeMedical Chilliwack opened on March 18, manager Shayli Vere was optimistic about the future. Eighteen days later the medical marijuana dispensary was raided by RCMP, Vere was arrested, the shop was shuttered by city hall and Vere and the society that manages WeeMedical are on the outs.

Just 18 days after opening its doors, Chilliwack's first medical marijuana dispensary is shuttered, raided by police Tuesday evening.

Even before it opened on March 19, WeeMedical Dispensary was warned by City of Chilliwack lawyers it was violating business licence and zoning bylaws.

A pot dispensary in Victoria is advertising discount medicinal marijuana on its sidewalk sandwich sign. 

"All it means is that at certain hours of the day, they can come in and get their medication  — edible or joint — for just a fraction cheaper," said Omar Manji, director of Remedy Medicinals in Victoria. 

"We are trying to dispense relief to our patients," he said.

Manji doesn't believe the stores 'happy hour' special sends the wrong message and says it is actually a popular business practice in California and Vancouver. 

The shop's website brands itself as 'Canada's premier medicinal marijuana dispensary' and even offers deals and prizes to users for mail orders. 

Canada's infatuation with getting a legal high may soon lead straight to Mary Jean Dunsdon's Vancouver kitchen. The self-described diva of cooking with cannabis has been baking and selling intoxicating edibles for the better part of 20 years.

"I've easily sold 700,000 to one million cookies," she told CBC News recently in her kitchen.

To her customers, Dunsdon, best known by her nickname Watermelon, is a trusted brand.

Mary Jean Dunsdon's baked cannabis treats include rum balls, tarts, cookies, and other sweets.

"I've done it all: 'nice cream cones', marijuana bacon, I've made 'weedish meatballs'," she said.

One of B.C.'s best-known medical cannabis promoters is in police custody.

Dana Larsen, a spokesperson for Sensible B.C., is on a cross-Canada tour to give away one million cannabis seeds.

After a speech to a standing-room-only crowd at a Days Inn in Calgary, he left the building because police were arresting a man outside.

According to a CBC News report, Larsen was holding seeds in his hand and was hauled away by offficers.

It sounds like torture. A living nightmare. 

But it could just as easily happen to you or me. Accidents that result in severe nerve pain are quite common.

Victoria, British Columbia businessman Dave Brownell, 68, found this out when he herniated a disc and ended up with serious nerve pain radiating throughout his body.

"Over the years, I've had all sorts of injuries, including a broken neck and chopping off the end of my finger. But I never ever before experienced pain like this." 

"Imagine jumping off a table and landing with one foot on a three-inch nail sticking out of a piece of wood," he adds. "That's the kind of pain I had pulsing through my legs once every minute or so -- all day long, all night long."