NCCEH E-news: The legalization of cannabis

New Fact Sheet: Environmental Health Risks of Personal Cannabis Cultivation

October 17th, 2018, is the day that the Canadian Federal government’s Cannabis Act (2017) comes into force. The Federal government will be responsible for regulating and enforcing industry-wide standards for commercial producers, while the provinces and territories will be responsible for overseeing the distribution and sale of cannabis. The NCCEH has developed some resources that provide public health professionals with the guidance and information they will need as cannabis legalization rolls out. The first resource we would like to share is a fact sheet that identifies health and safety concerns relevant to personal cultivation.

Evidence Review – Growing at Home: Health and Safety Concerns for Personal Cannabis Cultivation

Indoor cultivation and processing of cannabis may introduce or exacerbate certain environmental health risks in the home. The evidence presented in this review has been synthesized and organized for policy and decision-makers, environmental and medical health officers, and other public health professionals. This review offers a launching point for considering both wide-scale and regionally-oriented preventive actions to mitigate the environmental health risks that may arise from growing at home.

Cannabis Resources for Environmental Health Practitioners

The legalization of cannabis will bring many challenges, ranging from the difficulties of quickly establishing regulatory frameworks to the unknown consequences of widespread availability of this substance. We have created a topic page that provides key resources on various aspects of cannabis regulation and is intended to help environmental health practitioners get a broad introduction to public health objectives being used to develop cannabis policy

Announcements

Equity and Inclusion Lens Handbook

The Equity and Inclusion Lens Handbook, currently being implemented in the City of Ottawa, is an interactive tool that will help you to learn about equity and inclusion and to apply it to your work.

Free courses

The Provincial Infection Control Network of British Columbia (PICNET) provides online training opportunities for EPH professionals. They also give you the opportunity to revisit their past classes.

Healty Built Environment Toolkit Updated

The BCCDC has released an updated version of the “Healthy Built Environment Linkages Toolkit: making the links between design, planning and health” (Version 2.0). The HBE Linkages Toolkit synthesizes research and key messages to help describe how planning and design principles are linked to population health outcomes. A two page summary is available as well as the full document.

Ready-to-Eat Meats: Assessing the Food Safety Risks

The Ready-to-Eat Meats: Assessing the Food Safety Risks is available for free. PHIs can earn PDH credits by completing this course online.

In the Blog

Upcoming Events

October

18

21

Fourth International Conference on Law Enforcement and Public Health

23

The expanding range of mosquito and tick vectors: Importance of robust vector surveillance in Ontario

November

10

APHA Annual Meeting and Expo — "Creating the Healthiest Nation: Health Equity Now"

18

Building Safe & Inclusive Communities: The Public Health Approach

Recent Publications

Air

Built Environment

Drinking Water

Developing drinking-water quality regulations and standards. Geneva: WHO; 2018

Climate

Emergency Preparedness

Food

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Production of the NCCEH eNews has been made possible through a financial contribution from the Public Health Agency of Canada through the National Collaborating Centre for Environmental Health. NCCEH is one of six National Collaborating Centres for Public Health.