Workers’ Comp and Medicinal Marijuana

(Summer 2016) With many states legalizing medical marijuana, a new question arises: are employers and insurers expected to foot the bill for the drug as a component of workers’ compensation?

Many workers’ compensation payers are unequivocally denying coverage for medical marijuana. Experts note that payers are legally and medically justified in doing so, as medical marijuana is not a part of traditional workers’ compensation guidelines for work-related injuries. A few states, such as Michigan, Colorado and Vermont, clearly outline that workers’ compensation insurers are exempt from medical marijuana costs. States without clear-cut directives are seeing courts make judgments on treatments.

Meanwhile, some states are siding with the claimants. In New Mexico, the state’s Court of Appeals found, in three separate cases, that medical marijuana should be included in workers’ compensation packages. In an attempt to curb the ramifications of this decision, the state of New Mexico legislated that the most an injured worker could be compensated for medical marijuana was $12.02 per gram. New Mexico also capped claimants to half a pound of the drug during a three-month period.

Following suit, the Louisiana Court of Appeals backed a ruling that a worker’s prescription for a drug containing marijuana’s active ingredient, THC, was a valid medical expense. Likewise, Minnesota’s state health commissioner listed intractable pain as a condition that could be improved with medical marijuana; this, in turn, brought on a court case seeking workers’ compensation funds.

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