Medical marijuana insurance to be offered

SACRAMENTO, March 2 (UPI) -- A California insurance company says it is offering what it claims is the first nationally available insurance coverage for the medical marijuana industry.

Only 14 states allow medical marijuana use at present, but Statewide Insurance Services in Sacramento is offering the coverage in all 50 states, The Sacramento Bee reported Tuesday.

"Now that we can offer (services) in all 50 states," company spokesman Mike Aberle said, "we can start the minute they go legal, without delay."

The program will cover "all aspects of the industry," Aberle said, including medical marijuana dispensaries, workers' compensation, general liability, auto insurance (vehicles used to transport product), equipment breakdown/damage, property/product loss (including pot spoilage) and operations related to marijuana growing, the Bee reported.

Dispensaries began opening in 1996 when California voters approved a proposition allowing doctors to prescribe marijuana for treatment of any "illness for which marijuana provides relief."

There are an estimated 2,000 dispensaries in California now, industry observers say.

In 2009 the Obama administration announced it would cease arresting marijuana growers and sellers who abide by state laws.

Max Del Real, a lobbyist in Sacramento, called Statewide's program a milestone in an industry needing insurance protections for everyone in the distribution chain, from growers of medical marijuana to those who use it.