Cannabis in Greece

Greece has no legal recreational cannabis market and, since May 2026, not even a legal market in low-THC hemp flower. What it has is a small, tightly gated medical channel: pharmacy-dispensed cannabis flower grown in the Peloponnese, prescribed by five kinds of specialist, paid for entirely by the patient.

The criminal law is Law 4139/2013. Under Article 29, anyone who possesses or grows a narcotic in a quantity that only makes sense for personal use faces up to five months in prison, and the court may exempt a truly one-off offender from punishment altogether. A conviction of this kind is not entered on the copies of the criminal record that employers or authorities normally see. Supplying others is a different offense: trafficking under Article 20 carries at least eight years and a fine of up to EUR 300,000. Foreign visitors get no separate treatment: a few grams on a beach in Crete is prosecuted under the same article as a few grams in Athens.

Medical cannabis was legalized on paper in 2017, and Law 4523/2018 allowed licensed cultivation and processing. Then things stalled. Article 71 of Law 4864/2021 barred imports of finished medical cannabis products, so Greek patients had to wait for a domestic producer to finish a factory. The first prescriptions were only issued on 19 February 2024, using flower made by Tikun Olam in Examilia, Corinthia, and distributed to pharmacies through Pharmaserve-Lilly and Lavipharm.

Prescribing is restricted to anaesthesiologists, neurologists, oncologists, infectious-disease specialists and rheumatologists. Renewals can be written by a doctor of another specialty for six months, after which a specialist has to reassess. EOF's core product text of 25 November 2025 limits use to adults and never as first-line treatment, for chemotherapy-related nausea, chronic pain linked to cancer or nervous-system disease, spasticity in multiple sclerosis or spinal cord injury, appetite loss in palliative care and symptoms of inflammatory bowel disease. Nothing is reimbursed by the state insurer. At launch a 5 gram bag of the balanced THC/CBD product cost EUR 82.96, according to Business of Cannabis in February 2024, and Tikun Olam announced price cuts of 15 to 25% on 21 May 2026; check current pharmacy prices.

The regulator is EOF, the National Organization for Medicines. It authorizes each finished cannabis product for circulation and publishes forms for production and export licences. We could not find a public, searchable EOF list of dispensing pharmacies; the pages that claim to list "licensed cannabis pharmacies" are commercial and give no register behind them.

The consumer market was hit hard by Law 5302/2026, passed by Parliament on 15 May and published in Government Gazette A' 78 on 20 May 2026. Article 43 lifts the hemp THC limit in the drug law from 0.2% to 0.3% and takes dried flower from those hemp varieties out of the exemption that had let CBD shops sell buds. Retail sale, distribution to consumers, purchase and use of the flower are now prohibited, and EOF says the ban applies whatever the THC level. EOF told shops to comply at once and announced inspections. Wholesale of flower meant for industrial processing stays legal, and in a notice dated 28 May 2026 EOF said the new rules do not touch finished pharmaceutical cannabis products.

Articles 46 to 51 do not ban CBD retail but license it: only pharmacies and Region-licensed shops registered with the Health Ministry may sell "cannabis products" (up to 0.3% THC, or containing CBD, other than foods). I found no sign that the register is operating. A Health Ministry circular of 15 September 2026 lists as unlawful any retail product containing THC (other than pharmaceutical cannabis), cannabinoid vapes and smoking blends, and THC foods, supplements and, for now, cosmetics; CBD foods must meet novel-food rules and supplements must be THC-free with an EOF notification number.

The ban is contested. Greece's Economic and Social Committee warned that it runs against the European trend on CBD flower, and trade groups point to the EU Court of Justice's Kanavape judgment. Whether a court or the European Commission will step in is unknown as of September 2026.

I found no rule that recognizes a foreign prescription in Greek pharmacies, and import of cannabis is listed among the trafficking acts in the drug law. The health minister said in July 2024 that a decision for visiting patients was planned, but none had been published by September 2026. A tourist who needs treatment has to be assessed by a Greek specialist, which in practice is rarely realistic on a holiday. Verdex lists no clinics in Greece, because prescriptions come from ordinary doctors in the public or private system, not from cannabis clinics. The one verified operator on the site is the licensed producer whose product appears in EOF's own documents; a second, Curity Pharma, announced an operating licence in March 2025.