Supermarket chain Loblaws recently announced that it would cover prescription cannabis through its employee health benefits plan – a move that could have insurers turning their heads.
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Both Loblaws and pharmacy chain Shoppers Drug Mart have begun to accept claims for marijuana prescriptions “to treat spasticity and neuropathic pain associated with multiple sclerosis and nausea and vomiting in chemotherapy for cancer patients,” an internal memo for both companies said.
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Nearly 45,000 employees from Shoppers, Loblaw’s and Weston Foods (both corporate and store staff) will be eligible for medical marijuana coverage up to a maximum of $1,500 per year.
Paul Grootendorst, director of the division of social and administrative pharmacy in the Leslie Dan Faculty of Pharmacy at the University of Toronto, believes that the move can set a precedent for other Canadian employers.
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“If other companies are followers and they want to make sure the benefits package is competitive with a rival, they may themselves elect to start covering this,” Grootendorst told
Yahoo Finance. “This could be a pretty big deal in terms of getting the ball rolling.”
Grootendorst also mused on how the decision could set an example for the insurance industry, noting how covering the cost of marijuana is a whole different beast for the sector.
“I think it’s so new they don’t really know anything about it, [insurance] companies just don’t really know what they’re dealing with here,” he commented. “My sense is that if a company sees Shopper’s and Loblaws… companies with operations of that size doing it, they must think, well, if they’re doing it, marijuana must be good for those indications (conditions) at least and we’ll consider it.”
Currently, cannabis has yet to be assigned a drug identification number by Health Canada, which means employers have to ask insurers for “extra-contractual provisions” to provide coverage for the treatment..
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