OTTAWA: Marijuana lovers celebrated the full legalisation of the weed in Canada on Wed­nesday as the nation embarked on a controversial experiment in drug policy attempted by only one other country.

Scores of customers braved the cold for hours outside Tweed, a pot boutique in St John’s, Newfoundland that opened at midnight, to buy their first grams of legal cannabis.

Legalisation has sent stocks in pot companies soaring on the To­­ronto and New York stock exch­anges, but has also been sharply questioned by some health professionals and opposition politicians.

Published in Dawn, October 18th, 2018