France has granted continued access to medicinal cannabis for patients in its national pilot program, with the country's long-delayed permanent regulatory framework still pending final ministerial approval.
The French Ministry of Health confirmed earlier this month that patients would keep receiving treatment past the March 31 cutoff date, extending a program that had been scheduled to wind down as France moved toward a formalised medicinal cannabis system.
The extension was designed to stop patients from losing access to treatment without warning, though it offered no indication of when France's proposed general medicinal cannabis framework would officially come into force.
France has run a tightly controlled medicinal cannabis pilot since 2021, with access confined to specific conditions and product forms, including oils and flower approved only for vaporisation.
Although the permanent framework received European-level approval last year, it still needed final ministerial signatures before it could be enacted, leaving France in a prolonged state of regulatory uncertainty.
The ongoing delays will have been closely watched by Little Green Pharma, which has supplied medicinal cannabis into France since 2021, as part of the country's pilot program.
In earlier disclosures, LGP said France was part of its longer-term European growth strategy, with the company positioning itself to be among the first suppliers once a permanent regulatory framework opened.
That strategy has been backed by LGP's EU-GMP-certified cultivation and manufacturing facility in Denmark, situated around 1,200 kilometres from the French border.
Having taken part in the pilot, LGP previously said its product dossiers were already under regulatory review — a position it considered a "distinct advantage" in securing early market access once a permanent framework was put in place.
