Starting in 2020, Nevada employers cannot refuse to hire a job applicant for failing a marijuana screening test, making it the first state to pass such a law. "It is unlawful for any employer in this State to fail or refuse to hire a prospective employee because the prospective employee submitted to a screening test and the results of the screening test indicate the presence of marijuana," states the law, signed by Gov. Steve Sisolak on June 5.

A round the world, approximately 147 million people use cannabis. For many of them, the goal is to feel the effects of the plant’s psychoactive compound, ∆-9 tetrahydrocannabinol, better known as THC. While today it’s no mystery that marijuana can get you high, it’s unclear when humans made this discovery. On Wednesday, in Science Advances, an answer emerged: Humans have used cannabis for its psychoactive effects for at least 2,500 years.

Illegal cannabis storefronts have persisted in Toronto despite raids and attempts to bar the store's entryways using other means, including steel doors. Now, there's a new weapon in the city's battle against illegal dispensaries: giant cement blocks. 

Mourners gathered at a cemetery in what’s now western China around 2,500 years ago to inhale fumes of burning cannabis plants that wafted from small wooden containers. High levels of the psychoactive compound THC in those ignited plants, also known as marijuana, would have induced altered states of consciousness.

Long before marijuana became big business, a group of farmers headed to Humboldt County in One Good Year, which profiles a complete growing season in the remote backwoods.

If you need another reason to advocate for the legalization of marijuana—a new study shows why weed sold illegally on the street is more likely to have unacceptable levels of feces in it. They don't call it good shit for nothing.

The bill passed by the New York City Council was the latest in a series of steps to ease cannabis restrictions as efforts to legalize marijuana have stalled.

The Red Headed Stranger recently told ‘Rolling Stone’ that weed saved his life by helping him kick a booze habit. Willie Nelson is no stranger to weed, and in a recent interview with Rolling Stone, it may have kept him out of an early grave, too. The interview covered several aspects of Nelson’s life, including his celebrity-branded weed company and his ongoing musical pursuits. But the most shocking highlight came when he discussed how cannabis rescued him from his previous life as an alcoholic.

Illinois is poised to legalize marijuana sales with sweeping legislation that would also automatically expunge the criminal records of people convicted of minor pot possession. State lawmakers gave final approval to the bill Friday and Gov. JB Pritzker said he will sign the measure, which make Illinois the first state to legalize marijuana sales via its legislature. Most other states that have legalized cannabis did so via a ballot initiative process.

More and more Americans are reporting near-constant cannabis use, as legalization forges ahead.

There was medical cannabis news out today in the UK. It emerged that within the next month, it will be available on prescription. Currently cannabis-derived medicines are only prescribed in exceptional circumstances and a medical panel has to agree. The latest move represents a shift in the tone and the procedure by the government's Home Office.

A senior Canadian official says the government will pardon those with a pot possession record of 30 grams or less. The development comes as Canada legalizes so-called recreational marijuana beginning Wednesday. The official said Tuesday that those convicted of possessing of 30 grams or less of marijuana will be eligible for a pardon, but they will have to apply for one.

A moss-like plant grown only in a few countries may offer better pain relief than medical marijuana, animal research suggests.

When researchers convinced a group of young people to stop smoking pot, their cognition quickly improved. This adds to research warning against teen pot use, despite marijuana's growing acceptance.

The first Food and Drug Administration-approved drug containing an ingredient derived from the marijuana plant went on sale Thursday in the United States.

A substance that gives pot its kick appears to reduce the brain changes associated with Alzheimer's disease – at least in mice. In mice that had been genetically tweaked to develop symptoms like those of Alzheimer's, animals that received a synthetic form of tetrahydrocannabinol for six weeks performed as well as healthy mice on a memory test, scientists reported Tuesday at the Society for Neuroscience meeting in San Diego.

This week, a plant that's nearly identical to marijuana is set to become legal to grow in the US. Thanks to the US Farm Bill, which the House passed on Wednesday in a 369 to 47 vote, American farmers will be able to plant and harvest hemp, a strain of the same plant species from which marijuana originates. The bill passed the Senate Tuesday in an 87 to 13 vote, and President Donald Trump has indicated his support. Hemp legalization has been a longtime goal of Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, a Republican from Kentucky, who believes it can help replace tobacco as a key crop for his state's farmers.

Legislation comes ahead of a referendum on recreational marijuana use in next two years

Millions of Canadians use it. Here's what happens to your brain when you take a hit.

Thailand has become the first Asian country to legalize medicinal marijuana after parliament voted to amend a narcotics law. The country had a tradition of using marijuana to relieve pain and fatigue until the 1930s.

In a small study of infrequent cannabis users, Johns Hopkins Medicine researchers have shown that, compared with smoking cannabis, vaping it increased the rate of short-term anxiety, paranoia, memory loss and distraction when doses were the same.

Permitting pot is one thing; promoting its use is another.

Buried deep inside a mountain on a remote Norwegian island, agricultural institutions from around the globe are collaborating to safeguard important crops in the event of global catastrophe. That includes marijuana. Currently, there are over 29,500 marijuana seeds – including 31 strains of marijuana and 8 strains of hemp being held in the vault. That is more seeds than there are asparagus, blueberry or raspberry seeds stored at the facility.

A few years ago, I went to a new physician for a checkup. She ran through the list of questions that doctors like to ask...

More than half of people who take medical cannabis for chronic pain say they’ve driven under the influence of cannabis within two hours of using it, at least once in the last six months, according to a new study. One in five of them said they’d driven while ‘very high’ in the past six months, researchers from the University of Michigan Addiction Center report in the journal Drug & Alcohol Dependence .

The figure doubled from the year before.

As more states legalize cannabis consumption, many more people will likely use medical marijuana as a supplement to or substitution for prescription drugs, says a University of Michigan researcher. A new study by Daniel Kruger of the U-M Institute for Social Research found that 44 percent of medical cannabis users stopped taking a pharmaceutical drug, or used less of one, or both, in favor of cannabis.

New neuroimaging research provides new insight into how tetrahydrocannabinol, or THC, the main psychoactive compound in cannabis, affects the human brain. The study found that THC increases glutamate concentrations in the striatum, a major brain structure involved in the coordination of body movement, decision-making and the initiation of action.

CBS rejected a Super Bowl ad that makes a case for medical marijuana. Acreage Holdings, which is in the cannabis cultivation, processing and dispensing business, said it produced a 60-second ad that shows three people suffering from varying health issues who say their lives were made better by use of medical marijuana. Acreage said its ad agency sent storyboards for the ad to the network and received a return email that said: “CBS will not be accepting any ads for medical marijuana at this time.”

New research provides evidence that cannabis dependence is linked to altered activity in the striatum when receiving a socially rewarding stimulus. The study has been published in the journal European Neuropsychopharmacology. “Current addiction theories propose that repeated drug use leads to lasting changes in motivational processes mediated by drug-induced adaptations in the brain reward systems, particularly the striatum,” said study co-author Benjamin Becker of neuSCAN Lab and the University of Electronic Science and Technology of China.

CBS rejected a 60-second Super Bowl ad promoting the federal legalization of medical marijuana. The ad features three people with health issues who say that medical marijuana helped them: Austin, a Florence, CO, boy with Dravet syndrome (a type of epilepsy); Greg Kazmierczak, a man from Buffalo, NY, who has had three back surgeries and was on opioids for 15 years; and Ryan Miller, an Oakland, CA, former Army infantry officer who lost his leg due to a combat injury.

A history of smoking cannabis has unexpectedly been linked to greater fertility in men. The result came as a big surprise to scientists measuring the sperm counts of more than 600 men from couples attending a fertility clinic. They expected cannabis to have a detrimental effect on sperm count and fertility.

People who use party drugs say it gives them energy to dance and socialise, reduces their inhibitions and enhances their feelings of connection to others.

Oral use of cannabinoids could help manage pain and the urge to scratch in epidermolysis bullosa, according to a study that evaluated three case reports. 

The Food and Drug Safety Ministry said Tuesday that the National Assembly passed a bill to amend the law allowing imports and exports of non-hallucinogenic doses of medical marijuana. In November, the National Assembly of the country voted on amendments to the Act on the Management of Narcotic Drugs after the country’s Ministry of Food and Drug Safety said in July that the prescription of cannabis – based drugs Epidiolex, Marinol, Cesamet and Sativex for a number of conditions, including epilepsy and HIV / AIDS, would be finally allowed for patients.