Alberta joins Ontario in pulling some CannTrust weed products
11/07/2019 14:44
By Moira Warburton
TORONTO, July 11 (Reuters) - Alberta is placing an
unspecified amount of CannTrust TRST.TO products on hold as a
precautionary measure, officials said, pending an investigation
by Health Canada into whether cannabis from unlicensed
facilities is safe for consumption.
The move by the Alberta Gaming and Liquor Commission (AGLC)
comes after Ontario's cannabis distributor pulled CannTrust
products from its site. urn:newsml:reuters.com:*:nL2N24B0N4 CannTrust announced Health
Canada's findings of non-compliance in producing cannabis in
unlicensed facilities on Monday, precipitating a 40% drop in
stock value over the week. The company saw a decline of nearly
8% on Thursday. urn:newsml:reuters.com:*:nL4N2492XE
The CannTrust case is the most high profile occurrence of a
company being rapped by Canada's health regulator since the
country legalised recreational marijuana in October, potentially
raising questions about the ability of companies to achieve
growth and stay within the legal regulations as production ramps
up post-legalisation, analysts say.
CannTrust's Danish partner, StenoCare STENO.TE , announced
on Wednesday it was quarantining one batch of product it had
received, then increased that number to five on Thursday.
urn:newsml:reuters.com:*:nL8N24C255
"It is at the discretion of privately licensed Alberta
retailers to work in consultation with CannTrust and Health
Canada to determine whether they will continue to sell existing
inventory, should they have affected products," Heather Holmen,
spokeswoman for the AGLC, said in an email on Wednesday.
"As Health Canada has not issued a recall at this point,
AGLC will continue to monitor the situation and respond
accordingly once Health Canada releases their findings," she
said.
(Reporting by Moira Warburton
Editing by Bill Trott)
((Moira.Warburton@thomsonreuters.com;))