With more Canadians than ever having legal access to medical marijuana and with the legalization of recreational use promised this spring, Radical Gardens is positioning itself to take advantage of the market for THC-laced edibles.

Late next month, the local market and restaurant will be offering cooking classes to teach medical marijuana prescription holders how to cook their own edibles; from the stereotypical pot brownie to much more complicated recipes such as candies. Co-owner of Radical Gardens, Brianna Humphrey, said that locals have already been coming to her business asking for advice on how to prepare their medical marijuana.

Two more licensed medical marijuana producers have voluntarily recalled hundreds of grams of the drug after traces of a controversial pesticide banned in Canada were detected in their supply, raising questions about Ottawa’s oversight of an industry expected to explode with the upcoming legalization of cannabis.

Last week, Organigram, a publicly traded grower based in Moncton, expanded a Dec. 28 recall of a small amount of product to include almost all of its cannabis buds and oils produced in 2016.

Don’t look now but grandpa might be sparking a doobie.

A Centre for Addiction and Mental Health (CAMH) survey has shown that not only is marijuana use up among Ontario adults aged 18 and over, it has also increased in people aged 50 and over — rising from 3% in 1977 to 23% in 2015.

CAMH Dr. Robert Mann said the province’s pot users are definitely aging.

“The people who started using cannabis when they were teenagers, the baby boom generation, now that that group is getting older, they’re keeping their habits with them,” he said.

That sounds a lot like our American neighbours.

The Washington Post recently reported on a study showing that marijuana use has gone up “significantly” in the last decade among Americans over age 50.

Toronto's marijuana dispensaries had a turbulent 2016, and there are no signs 2017 will be any different for the fledgling businesses and their many customers.

The dispensaries plan to continue selling marijuana and police plan to continue raiding them.

"They are serving a need," Michael McLellan, spokesperson for the Canadian Cannabis Retail Council, said of Toronto's marijuana dispensaries.

"There are still tens of thousands — if not hundreds of thousands — of patients frequenting marijuana retailers here in Toronto and I think they will continue to do so," McLellan said in an interview.

Tania Cyalume and Brandy Zurborg are the brains behind Bloorcourt’s Queens of Cannabis, a dispensary that sells to approved medical marijuana patients. But it’s so much more than that – it’s also a healing centre.

A knowledgable, articulate couple who live and work together, Cyalume and Zurborg were patients with medical cannabis prescriptions before deciding to open a dispensary. Originally hoping to start a female-oriented head shop, they were inspired to go the dispensary route after a trip to Vancouver, where they experienced that city’s dispensary culture while shopping for woman-made wholesale pipes.

Toronto police have begun a pilot project testing the use of roadside screening devices for drug-impaired driving.

The project - which continues through to next spring - will test how well officers are able to use certain roadside drug−testing devices on motorists under different weather conditions and at night.

It is part of a national effort aimed at testing how police forces can detect drug-impaired drivers, with forces in Vancouver, Halifax and Gatineau, Que., as well as the Ontario Provincial Police and certain RCMP detachments taking part.

Toronto police say the information they will be collecting will help develop practices for the use of "oral-fluid" screening devices in Canada.

This was not your ordinary cooking class.

Barb Mahy was making her basic “canna chocolates,” a simple mix of semi-sweet chocolate, coconut butter and a cannabis tincture mix with glycerine and water which she melted and poured into moulds.

About a dozen people sat at tables and chairs to watch the demonstration Saturday upstairs in The Barn, a wellness co-operative in a refurbished barn along Highway 26 between Meaford and Thornbury. Along with 20 vendors and five practitioners, the co-op has an education mandate fulfilled with events like this.

As Canada struggles to reduce the number of people addicted to and overdosing on opioids, some doctors say cannabis may be part of the solution.

They are finding it can replace or reduce the use of pharmaceutical painkillers. 

“Can cannabis be used to help manage patients who are currently taking opioids? Broadly, the answer is yes,” says Dr. Alan Bell, a family physician, clinical researcher and professor at the University of Toronto. “Cannabinoids are far safer than opioids, there is no doubt about that. No one has died from a cannabinoid overdose.”

Selling pot at the liquor store isn't sparking up overwhelming public support, according to stats released in a new poll.

The Forum Research survey provided exclusively to the Toronto Sun found that more than a third of Ontarians (36%) think pharmacies are the best place to sell recreational pot, not the Liqour Control Board of Ontario (LCBO) as Premier Kathleen Wynne has suggested. The survey says that specialized marijuana dispensaries rank second with 26% support while selling pot at the LCBO ranked lower with 16% support.