KANSAS CITY, Mo. — In less than six months since the first licensed sale of medical marijuana in Missouri, there have been more than 143,000 applications with the state's Department of Health and Senior Services for patients, caregivers and growers.
The first licensed sale of medical marijuana in the state was last October.
It came after Missouri voters approved medical marijuana in Nov. 2018.
According to the latest numbers released by the Missouri Department of Health and Senior Services, that agency has approved 97,315 patient applications as of Monday.
A breakdown of the approved applications can be found below:
That number includes over 24,000 renewals.
The state has also approved 2,621 caregiver licenses, including over 400 renewals.
The department has also issued 2,932 agent IDs.
Those IDs are for people who work at state licensed medical marijuana facilities.
In addition to those facilities, patients and caregivers can seek state approval to grow their own medical marijuana.
As of Monday, the state has issued 24,062 approvals to cultivate.
Not every potential patient, caregiver or worker gets approved.
So far, the state has denied a total of 6601 applications or about 4% of all the applications received.
The Missouri Department of Health and Senior Services is also in the process of making it easier for doctors to apply for patients.
By next month, that process is on target to be completely electronic or on-line.
