Medical cannabis dispensary availability improved self-reported mental health among older adults in New York

Abstract

Evidence regarding cannabis legalization's effects on mental health remains mixed, despite both rapid increases in cannabis use and an ongoing mental health crisis in the United States. We use granular geographic data to estimate medical cannabis dispensary availability's effects on self-reported mental health in New York state from 2011 through 2021 using a two-stage difference-in-differences approach to minimize bias introduced from the staggered opening of dispensaries. We find that medical cannabis availability reduced past-month self-reported poor mental health days by nearly 15 %—3.77 percentage points—among adults 65 and above. Our findings also rule out that medical cannabis availability had negative effects on having past-month poor mental health days for the adult population overall. These results suggest medical cannabis, where it is geographically available, has positive mental health impacts for older populations.