Tests run on cannabis vaporizer cartridges recently obtained by Leafly at illegal California stores show shocking levels of pesticide contamination and toxic vitamin E oil.
By law, those shops shouldn’t even exist, let alone sell tainted THC vape oil to an unsuspecting public. Under Proposition 64, which took effect Jan. 1, 2018, all medical and adult-use cannabis retailers must have a state-issued license.
Despite those regulations, thousands of unlicensed cannabis shops still operate throughout the state. Because they’re not following the rules, the products they sell are not subject to stringent potency and purity testing requirements.
Illicit vendors remain especially abundant in Los Angeles. More than 22 months into legalization, officials have shut down only a small portion of LA’s many unlawful cannabis shops.
Meanwhile, an unprecedented, national mass poisoning event has sickened nearly 1,400 and killed at least 33 from vaping-associated pulmonary injury (VAPI). And evidence amassed by the federal Centers for Disease Control (CDC) and other sources have identified street THC carts as the key vector in the nationwide VAPI outbreak. So Leafly went shopping in the street markets for so-called ‘fart carts’.