Eager customers are 1st to get medical marijuana in Illinois .

Patients bought $210,000 of medical marijuana in the first week it was legal in Illinois, marking what patients and industry officials said was a welcome, if overdue, start.
"By and large, things have gone well," said Joseph Wright, director of the Illinois Medical Marijuana Pilot Program.
More than 800 patients bought 13,000 grams of cannabis since the state's first dispensaries opened Monday. That's about half an ounce per customer, at an average price of $16 per gram, or about $450 per ounce.
That's higher than the average black-market price for pot in Illinois, which runs at $350 for an ounce of a high-grade variety, according to the crowdsourced priceofweed.com. But advocates say it's reasonable considering the program provides a high-quality product tested to verify its content.

To buy the cannabis, prequalified patients had to designate a dispensary of choice. A small number of patients were turned away because their designations did not show up in the state database, but regulators were working to correct that, Wright said.
The opening of a few dispensaries amounted to a soft launch of the industry in Illinois, the 23rd state to legalize medical marijuana, though the drug remains illegal under federal law. Only about 3,300 patients are registered statewide, far below what is needed to sustain the program but a decent start, industry officials said.

About 500 applicants were denied participation, most because they didn't submit all documentation or have one of roughly 40 qualifying medical conditions, such as cancer, HIV or seizures, state officials said.
Supply and demand
In the program's first week, seven dispensaries opened, supplied by four cultivation centers — well below the 60 dispensaries and 22 grow houses originally authorized. But industry officials said the incremental launch gave them a chance to work out the kinks of the program.
Ross Morreale, chairman of the Medical Cannabis Alliance of Illinois and chief compliance officer of Ataraxia, a grow house in downstate Albion,, called the first week a success. He made deliveries to all the open dispensaries, which all had to reorder inventory this week, in some cases multiple times.
"The demand has been really strong, which is great, and patients seem to be really enjoying the experience," Morreale said. "When you see the patients, it just makes you feel good that you're providing relief for them."

Officials predicted that prices will come down somewhat as more producers start operations and more dispensaries open. The state projects up to 25 dispensaries will open by the end of the year.
Name game
The industry is largely run by investors and professionals from other businesses such as real estate and law, thanks in part to extensive application requirements, which include showing proof of $500,000 in liquid assets to get a license to grow the plant.
And though many of the dispensaries have been set up to look like doctors' offices, some of the drug strains' names are more evocative of the stoner culture associated with recreational pot: Blue Dream, Grape God Bud, Jah Kush, Death Star and White Poison.
The strains are based on cross-breeding various properties of the two species of marijuana: sativa, known for its effects on the mind, and indica, known for its more relaxing, sedating effects on the body.
Each strain mixes various levels of known active ingredients, primarily THC, which gets users high, and CBD, which is not psychoactive but is purported to have antiseizure and anti-inflammatory properties.
Uncertain origins
The first crop originated as clones, or small cuttings, from plants on the black market or from legal operations in other states. But transporting marijuana across state lines is a federal offense, and state regulators don't ask where seedlings come from.
The plants are grown indoors, where the light, temperature and humidity can be strictly controlled and contaminants kept at bay.
After about three months, the plants are harvested, trimmed and dried. Samples must be sent to independent laboratories to be tested for potency and contaminants. In the final stage, the product can be extracted into oils or ground into flour to make lotions, patches and "edibles" such as cookies, chocolates and gummy bears.
Each plant is tracked by a bar code from seed to sale, and any unused portions must be destroyed. In the first couple of weeks, only the plant products were available, not edibles, until that process is completed.
Registration
To register, patients must go to mcpp.illinois.gov to fill out an online application. Patients or caregivers must submit electronically scanned fingerprints for a criminal background check, get a doctor to certify that they have one of the qualifying medical conditions and pay the application fee of $100, or $50 for veterans and those on Social Security disability. Patients also must choose one dispensary, but can change it overnight if they wish.
Some groups remained adamantly opposed to the idea of medical marijuana. The head of the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration, Chuck Rosenberg, reportedly called medical marijuana "a joke," noting that it hasn't gone through the strict regulatory testing that prescription drugs do. That prompted tens of thousands of people to sign a petition calling for his resignation. Federal law puts the drug in the same risk category as heroin.
Many of the patients who lined up for medical marijuana this week did not appear to be young stoners, but middle-age people with serious health problems. Many said they had never or rarely smoked before but were hoping to relieve their pain and get off prescription narcotics.
Chicago's Laura Furlan, who is battling cancer and multiple sclerosis, was trying three strains, hoping they would help with migraines, muscle spasticity and nausea.
"Hopefully it will bring a lot of relief," she said. "It's a little surreal. I'm just so glad it finally happened."