West Virginia: from grow to patient, what the label has to show

Step by step: West Virginia

1. Step 1: Indoor grow, tracked in Metrc (Grower/processor) A permitted grower/processor may grow, harvest and process only inside a secure, enclosed indoor facility in West Virginia. The Office of Medical Cannabis relies on Metrc, its seed-to-sale system, and incoming plants and seeds are logged within 24 hours. Harvested plant material is inspected for mold, pests and rot. The label’s grower/processor name, address and permit number start here.
2. Step 2: The lab’s employee collects (Approved laboratory) The grower/processor must contract with an independent laboratory that the Bureau for Public Health has approved. Under the rules a sample is cannabis collected by an employee of the approved lab at the grower/processor, not by the grower. Deliveries to a lab run only between 7 a.m. and 9 p.m., and the lab logs and verifies every sample it receives.
3. Step 3: Two tests by law (Approved laboratory) The Medical Cannabis Act calls for a test at harvest and another at final processing, all product is tested as the Bureau directs, and every lab must be certified by the Office of Laboratory Services. A 2022 legislative audit described the state’s own cannabis lab as checking for fungal and bacterial contamination, pesticide residues, metals and solvents, plus cannabinoid and terpene levels.
4. Step 4: Results to the Bureau (Approved laboratory) The lab reports results in the form the Bureau sets and keeps test dates and results for each sample. It must report at least THC, THCA, THCV, CBD, CBDA, CBDV, CBN, CBG and CBC, plus any other cannabinoid above 0.1 percent, and those figures go on the label. Product sold on to another organization needs a set total THC and total CBD.
5. Step 5: Recall and disposal (Bureau / OMC) Every medical cannabis organization keeps a recall system for defective product. When a product poses a risk to public health, the grower/processor isolates and retrieves it and coordinates its disposal with the Bureau, which may oversee it. An analytics platform watches the Metrc data and alerts the Office to unusual activity.
6. Step 6: Package + Bureau-approved label (Grower/processor packaging) The Bureau must give prior written approval of every label’s content. Packages are child-resistant, tamper-evident, light-resistant, opaque and resealable, each process lot gets a unique identifier, and nothing may appeal to children. The label lists form, weight, doses, species, THC and CBD percentages, the packer’s employee ID, dates, storage instructions and two required warnings.
7. Step 7: Dispensary hands it over sealed (Dispensary) A dispensary gives the product to a registered patient or caregiver in a sealed, properly labeled, child-resistant package. The original seal may be broken only by a dispensary, for quality control testing at an approved lab, or in a Bureau loss investigation. The label also names the dispensary and its address, and must say to keep the product in its original container.