Australia’s leading medical and pharmaceutical organisations have formally urged the federal government to tighten regulations on medicinal cannabis prescribing, citing a growing number of hospital admissions for cannabis-induced psychosis and other adverse outcomes.

They warn that loosened controls are enabling patients to bypass established safeguards through clinics operating outside traditional care pathways.

The Australian Medical Association and the Pharmacy Guild of Australia have jointly called on Health Minister Mark Butler to intervene after health workers flagged alarming trends: emergency departments across the country are seeing rising numbers of patients admitted with psychosis, dependence, cognitive impairment, and symptoms consistent with cannabis hyperemesis syndrome, attributed to high-tetrahydrocannabinol (THC) medicinal cannabis products.

In some cases, vulnerable patients with pre-existing psychiatric conditions were reportedly prescribed cannabis despite known risks.

In response to mounting concerns, the Australian Health Practitioner Regulation Agency (AHPRA), in conjunction with National Boards, has issued new prescribing guidance aimed at curbing unsafe practices.

The guidance reminds clinicians that medicinal cannabis should be treated with the same care as other drugs of dependence.

Prescribers must now carry out comprehensive assessments, document therapeutic justification, liaison with existing treating clinicians, develop exit strategies and avoid using cannabis as a first-line therapy.

Regulators flagged several red flags: certain practitioners issuing extraordinarily large volumes of prescriptions (one reportedly wrote over 17,000 in six months, others exceeded 10,000), ultrashort consultations lasting mere seconds, prescribing to minors without verifying identity, prescribing multiple unapproved products to patients, and structures embedding conflicts of interest where prescribing and dispensing are vertically integrated.

AHPRA warns that such models may encourage profit over patient welfare.

In its statement, AHPRA emphasised it would investigate any prescribers with anomalously high rates of cannabis prescribing — even in the absence of formal complaints.

The regulator further affirmed its collaboration with the Therapeutic Goods Administration and state and territory authorities to review prescribing patterns and improve oversight.

The AMA welcomed the new guidelines, attributing the proliferation of direct-to-consumer telehealth models as a key driver of the lax prescribing environment.

The association stressed that existing regulatory frameworks were not designed to police the digital expansion of cannabis prescribing, calling for additional resources and legislative reforms to close loopholes and protect public health.

Clinical observers note that the prescribing of medicinal cannabis has ballooned in recent years.

One academic review calculate that prescriptions of medicinal cannabis in Australia have increased fifteen-fold since 2019, raising serious questions about the adequacy of evidence for many off-label uses and the risks posed to psychiatric health.

The new regulatory impulses make clear that authorities are now seeking to recalibrate the balance between access and safety.