On 1 August 2022, Swiss National Day, Switzerland’s revised Narcotics Act entered into force. The revision aims at facilitating medical treatments and improving research and development of cannabis. Prior to the revised law, patients and physicians had to apply for special authorization from the Federal Office of Public Health if they wanted to access cannabis for medical purposes. The amendment will allow numerous patients safe and timely access to cannabis medicines as part of their treatment regime. This signifies a further step in modernizing Switzerland’s legislation on cannabis.

Several providers of online games of luck and chance were recently confronted with the blocking of their websites by Swiss authorities. In two recent decisions, the Swiss Federal Supreme Court approved these blockings, confirming that foreign providers need to take appropriate technical measures from the outset to prevent their website from being blocked in Switzerland. Below, we provide a short overview of the legislative background of such blockings and the reasoning of the SFSC in its decisions. Moreover, we set out the most important considerations for foreign providers of online games of luck and chance in Switzerland.