Marijuana patients living in six Arizona counties have to travel outside them to shop at a medical dispensary.

The Arizona Department of Health Services plans to issue a half-dozen licenses on Friday.

Apache, Cochise, Gila, Graham, Greenlee and Santa Cruz counties currently have no medical marijuana dispensaries. Yet each county is home to at least one recreational weed store.

State law limits the number of medical marijuana dispensaries, unless there is none in a county where there is an approved application.

Dozens of applications were filed with the state health department in December.

Now the agency will issue a nonprofit medical dispensary license for use in each of the counties without a store.

Random drawings will be held for the permits in two counties because more than one applicant hopes to open there.