The government sells two varieties ranging from about $10 to $12 a gram - enough for up to four joints. Coffee shops sell it for as little as $5 a gram, with only the highest-quality weed fetching prices comparable to the government's.
Under the liberal Dutch approach dating to the 1970s, the law forbids privately growing and selling marijuana, and has no tolerance for dealing in hard drugs, but refrains from prosecuting the sale of small amounts.
The medicinal program allows pharmacies to sell standardized, quality-controlled marijuana from authorized growers to sufferers of chronic or terminal diseases such as multiple sclerosis, HIV/AIDS, neuralgia, cancer and Tourette's syndrome.
The competition comes from hundreds of marijuana bars, thinly disguised as "coffee shops" to maintain the fiction of legality. Though patronized mostly by recreational smokers and tourists, people in pain who find relief from cannabis are also customers, paying less than they would to a pharmacy
Erik Bosman, manager of the Dampkring coffee shop, says many of his regulars are medical patients, and he even used to offer discounts for people with prescriptions.
