Cannabis Is Being Used To Treat Depression And Anxiety

Thousands of Britons are being prescribed super-strength cannabis for anxiety and depression.

Despite experts warning of the dangers, private clinics are giving it out after only one video consultation and boast the powerful drug can be ‘delivered directly to the patient’s door via a next-day service’.

Amid an epidemic of cannabis use on our streets, a Daily Mail audit has discovered specialist pharmacies are prescribing nearly 10,000 different products – including ultra-strong strains imported from Amsterdam with names such as Ghost Train Haze, Dante’s Inferno and White Widow.

Benefits claimants who signed off work with mental health problems are offered complimentary consultations and up to 20 per cent off the cost of the drug.

NHS prescriptions are tightly regulated, but dozens of private clinics are handing out 99 per cent of the medical cannabis in Britain.

Marijuana – which the NHS warns significantly increases the chance of extreme mental health problems – is routinely being prescribed privately for mental health conditions, including anxiety, depression, OCD, mood disorders and ADHD.

Illegal smokers of the drug are even encouraged to contact clinics ‘to see if their usage could be legitimised’ with a prescription.

The entire process is, shockingly, perfectly legal, thanks to loopholes in the law.

There are concerns that the massive expansion in the distribution of high-strength medicinal cannabis in recent years may be a factor in the surge in drug-induced psychosis and mental health issues that are straining the already overburdened National Health Service (NHS) and placing further pressure on law enforcement.

The de facto legalisation of the drug – with police told not to arrest people for cannabis possession if there are ‘justifiable grounds’ for believing it could be for medical use – has raised concerns that companies exploiting lax regulations have created a pseudo-recreational market.

Data obtained under the Freedom of Information Act reveals there were 88,214 unlicensed cannabis products prescribed privately in the first two months of 2025, the most recent data obtainable.

In 2024, there were 659,293 unlicensed cannabis products prescribed – equal to nearly ten tons of weed – up from 282,920 in 2023, data from the NHS Business Services Authority shows.

Sir Robin Murray, professor of psychiatric research at King’s College London, described it as ‘outrageous’. He said the rising strength of the products posed ‘an increased risk of dependence and psychiatric side-effects’, adding: ‘There are no randomised controlled trials showing that cannabis benefits psychiatric disorders and a lot of evidence that it causes them. It’s a bit like taking alcohol for depression – some people find it helps in the short term, but in the long term it makes things worse.’

Data from one of the largest private clinics, Mamedica, reveals that 50.5 per cent of its more than 12,000 patients in the UK are prescribed cannabis for mental health disorders. If this is consistent across the industry, tens of thousands are being prescribed medical cannabis for a mental health condition.

Benefits applicants can receive free consultations and discounted “weed” from certain private clinics.

Tory health spokesman Stuart Andrew last called on the Government to act on the Mail’s ‘extremely concerning’ findings. He said: ‘Ministers must act to tackle this abuse of the system.’

Medical cannabis was legalised in 2018 after a campaign to make it available to children with severe epilepsy. Licensed products – which do not contain the entire plant – can be prescribed on the NHS for severe epilepsy, nausea from chemotherapy, or for muscle spasms caused by multiple sclerosis.

However, private clinics can legally prescribe unlicensed products that have not undergone strictly controlled medical trials.

Dozens of specialist pharmacies offer products with a THC (the psychoactive ingredient) content of more than 30 per cent. Freedom of Information data reveals that the volume prescribed rose from 2.7 million grams in 2022 to 9.8 million grams in 2024.

It also reveals there has been an upsurge in the number of people being prescribed higher-potency cannabis. The most popular potency in 2022 was between 18 and 22 per cent THC, but in the first two months of 2025, products above 22 per cent made up almost half of prescriptions.

Mamedica said it is prescribed based on a ‘strictly regulated clinical and legal framework’, with all prescriptions issued by a registered doctor in accordance with Home Office, MHRA and CQC requirements. A spokesman said: ‘Prescribing takes place on a named-patient basis by specialist clinicians and operates under established medicines law and regulatory oversight.

‘Mental health is one of the most common reasons patients seek specialist care after conventional treatments have failed. Patients presenting with conditions such as anxiety, PTSD and depression are assessed individually and managed under strict safeguarding and shared-care protocols.’

A Government spokesman said: ‘We expect regulators to crack down on those private providers who prescribe to patients without the proper clinical care they need.

‘More widely, we’re also looking at private prescribing to ensure patients have access to high-quality medicines through all legal routes.’

Cannabis is extremely good for pain in small amounts. It permits the body to relax, but as for giving it to mentally ill patients, it’s a no from me. I know several people with mental health problems who have smoked cannabis, and they have said it makes them feel violent.

However, I have known numerous people who have mental health problems who are on prescription drugs. They make them put on weight excessively, causing several other conditions to go with it. It’s a rock and hard place, I’m afraid.

If cannabis were regulated, it would be much better for those who really need it. They smoke it all the time in Amsterdam, but there doesn’t seem to be a mental health crisis there, and the US don’t seem to have a crisis either, where it is legal, unless you’re a lefty, then that is your mental health crisis.