Now that Colorado law allows the use of marijuana for both medical and recreational purposes, the concern for some parents and other adults has been how to keep the edible forms of marijuana out of the hands of minors.

The Christian Science Monitor reports that, earlier this week, Colorado Governor John Hickenlooper (D) signed a new law into effect that required that packaging for medical marijuana edibles be childproof. Such a provision is already built into the laws governing the use of recreational marijuana.

The law received wide support, especially from the marijuana industry itself, which hopes to maintain an image of diligence for its product and avoid incidents where children ingest marijuana in edible forms, which can include candies, suckers, cookies, and other baked goods.

Marijuana is dispensed in this form to allow it to be administered to people who can not or do not wish to inhale marijuana smoke or vapor. The effects are somewhat different and can take longer to manifest, which can lead to someone consuming more of the substance than they intended. There is no such thing as a “marijuana overdose”, other than to say that someone took more of a dose than they intended.

Rachel O’Bryan, an attorney and member of Smart Colorado, a group pushing for tighter regulation of the marijuana industry, says that the packaging laws help, but that adults should also be held responsible or any incidents that happen with the marijuana they bought.

One such incident occurred at a middle school in Colorado last week, when a boy brought t some marijuana candy to school and gave it to other kids who did not know it was any different from regular candy. That incident resulted in three arrests, but 15 students were involved.

It is these types of difficulties that parents, marijuana sellers, and government officials all hope to work together to prevent through a combination of strict penalties and preventive measures such as packaging. Many of these measures are similar to how alcohol is handled now.

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