Oregon Officials Ban Marijuana-Infused Alcohol
The Oregon Liquor Control Commission has ruled that starting January 1, 2020, it’s prohibited for any alcoholic benerage to contain THC or CBD, which are bothcompounds found in marijuana.
According to Reuters, Mark Pettinger, spokesman for the agency, cited concerns raised by the U.S. Food and Drug of potential liver damage from CBD, also known as cannabidiol.
“We’ve wanted to address the issue of CBD getting into alcohol and because there are a lot of unknown unknowns about the effect of taking CBDs,” Pettinger said Friday. “There’s very little scientific evidence. People are using them for wellness, but how they interact with other substances, not a lot is known.”
The statement, of course, comes off as rather hypocritical, given that alcohol IS proven to cause liver damage.
One prominent CBD-infused beer, Two Flowers IPA, was popular in The EastBurn, a Portland pub, according to Michael Fritz, one of the owners.
“We were the first bar to put it on tap,” Fritz said. “It was a nice IPA.”
The website of the brewery that made the beer, Coalition Brewing of Portland, said the CBD’s “bitter grassiness augments the hop bitterness, while the citrusy terpenes in the CBD mirror the aromatics and hop flavors”, reports Reuters. Fritz said he didn’t notice any additional effect from the beer besides the alcohol.
“If you have three beers, you’re going to feel like you had three beers,” Fritz said. “You’re going to feel relaxed.”
Coalition Brewing recently went out of business, Fritz said, adding that his own customers drained the last of the CBD-infused beer 10 days ago. “It was a really good seller for us,” Fritz said.
Pettinger said he didn’t know of any other Oregon brewery that makes CBD-infused beer. “He said that until federal agencies establish regulations surrounding CBD, that his agency felt it needed to step in and impose the ban”, notes Reuters. “The Oregon agency will next work on banning a bar from mixing a non-alcoholic CBD beverage on the premises with an alcoholic beverage to create a CBD cocktail.”