Winnipeg medical-marijuana patients hailed a federal court ruling that struck down "arbitrary and overbroad" legislation from the former Conservative government banning Canadian medical pot users from growing their own weed.

And the one company in Winnipeg with a federal licence to supply medical marijuana indicated the ruling won’t affect it, at least not in the short term.

The city’s most vocal advocate for medical-marijuana rights said even without knowing whether Ottawa will appeal the ruling, he couldn’t contain his delight.

Marijuana legalization has been a political issue in the United States for some time, and while it remains illegal in most states, others have softened their stance in recent years. Colorado and Washington both passed initiatives by popular vote to decriminalize and legalize cannabis in 2012. In 2014, Oregon, Alaska and Washington, D.C., followed suit. Many states including Massachusetts, California, Missouri, Hawaii, Maine, Nevada and Ohio have flirted with legalization for a few election cycles, with buzz growing.

The United States isn't the only country where people use marijuana legally or illicitly. In fact, it isn’t even the country with the highest reported marijuana use.

Canadian medical marijuana producers plunged after a federal court threw out a series of regulations that restrict the private growth and consumption of the substance.

Canopy Growth Corp., based in Smiths Falls, Ontario, plunged as much as 12 percent and was down 8.7 percent to C$2.88 at 1:50 p.m. in Toronto, the most in seven weeks and erasing gains for the year. Smaller producer Aphria Inc. sank as much as 13 percent, the most since November.

In a ruling delivered Wednesday, federal court justice Michael Phelan declared Canada’s 2013 “Marihuana for Medical Purposes Regulations” invalid, saying they violated the constitutional rights of patients who use marijuana.

BC’s NDP is planning a trip to Washington State to learn more about how well the legalization and regulation of marijuana is working out.

Mike Farnworth and Carole James are heading to Washington state.

“Prime Minister Trudeau made [legalization] a key election plank in his quest for victory, and I believe that it’s responsible for us here in BC to start addressing this issue and being prepared for when that actually happens,” says BC NDP leader John Horgan.

VANCOUVER - Canada's marijuana confusion has become chaos.

The nation's medical cannabis scheme was found unconstitutional Wednesday by the Federal Court of Canada.

Federal Court Justice Michael Phelan said the Marihuana for Medical Purposes Regulations, which replaced the Medical Marihuana Access regulations in April 2014, violated the liberty and security interests of the charter.

He gave the government six months to fix the law.

"The access restrictions did not prove to reduce risk to health and safety or to improve access to marihuana — the purported objectives of the regulation," wrote Phelan, who heard evidence in the case last spring.

Canada’s nascent medical marijuana industry is being thrown into new turmoil by a court ruling that threatens to undercut its business model.

Leading pot producers such as Canopy Growth Corp., Aphria Inc., Aurora Cannabis Inc. and Mettrum Health Corp. came into being for one specific reason: The federal government introduced rules in 2014 that required patients to buy marijuana from licensed producers. Prior to that, patients were getting licences to grow at home, making it difficult for Ottawa to regulate the sector.

The decision Wednesday from federal court judge Michael Phelan could bring elements of the old system back. He gave patients the right to grow their own cannabis, arguing the current system restricts access to the drug.

A landmark ruling by a B.C. judge has cleared the way for medical marijuana users to grow pot at home, but recreational marijuana use remains illegal across Canada -- a fact that interim Conservative leader Rona Ambrose says is unclear to most Canadians.

On casual marijuana use, Ambrose said that “everyone thinks it’s legal because Justin Trudeau has been elected and he’s for legalizing pot.”

“(The Liberals) moved ahead with signalling that pot is legal all across this country. That’s what everyone actually thinks, when in fact the law doesn’t say that yet,” Ambrose told CTV’s Power Play on Wednesday.

The line keeps getting longer for groups and businesses looking to be able to sell marijuana when the Trudeau government legalizes it.

London Drugs Vice President of Pharmacy John Tse says the drugstore chain is exploring the idea of selling legal pot through its pharmacies.

“When it gets classified as a legal product, Health Canada will most likely regulate it, because there’s regulated producers as well. The product that’s being produced will also be very well controlled, and most likely deemed as a drug. We believe that it would be distributed – and should be distributed – through pharmacies where pharmacies can help guide people to use this on a medical basis.”

As the federal government moves cautiously (and, at times, clumsily) toward fulfilling its promise to legalize marijuana, one of the key questions is: Where will pot be sold?

There are several options:

A federal court judge in Vancouver on Wednesday ruled that medical marijuana patients have the Constitutional right to grow their own cannabis, striking down a ban introduced by Canada's previous Conservative government.

The court suspended its decision for six months to give Ottawa time to respond.

A group of British Columbia residents took Canada to court in 2013, arguing a new law requiring medical marijuana patients to buy cannabis from licensed producers, instead of growing their own, was unconstitutional.

They said marijuana grown under the government system was too expensive and did not allow them to control the strains and dosages of their treatment.