CannTrust Suspends Sales & Shipments Following Health Canada Crackdown

Embattled Canadian cannabis company CannTrust has voluntarily suspended all sales and shipments of its products after Health Canada found that it had produced cannabis in five unlicensed rooms at a greenhouse. The health agency determined that CannTrust had given them inaccurate information on licensing forms related to the cultivation site.

The company announced on Thursday that they had convened a special committee of the board of directors comprised of independent board members  to investigate the matter “in its entirety.”

The halting of all sales and shipments by CannTrust comes after Health Canada placed an inventory hold on 5,200 kilograms of flower grown at the company’s Pelham, Ontario facility. In response, CannTrust placed its own voluntary hold on the equivalent of 7,500 kilograms of flower products at its Vaughan, Ontario facility that had been produced using flower from the Pelham greenhouse.

The rooms in question had received a license from Health Canada in April, but the company said the flower was grown at the facility from October 2018 to March while the applications for the rooms were still pending.

On Thursday, Danish company StenoCare said it had quarantined five batches of cannabis oil produced at CannTrust’s Pelham facility. StenoCare did not indicate how much of the imported CannTrust oil had reached consumers but said all of the products were tested by a third-party laboratory and met health standards for medical cannabis products.

CannTrust CEO Peter Aceto admitted that the firm “made errors in judgment” but were working “to make this right.” Neither CannTrust nor StenoCare were able to offer estimates on the financial losses associated with the products.

Health Canada is investigating the facilities and initially estimated that action would be complete in 10 to 12 business days.