If marijuana has no medical value, why synthetic pot???

[spanone]

This kind of bullshit makes no sense at all.

So a few weeks ago the FDA says marijuana has NO legitimate medical effects, ah but now they might approve a synthetic marijuana? Guess you can't grow the synthetic at home and bypass a major pharma making the money.

Synthetic marijuana drug coming to chemo patients

Tuesday, May 16, 2006; Posted: 5:41 p.m. EDT (21:41 GMT)


WASHINGTON (AP) -- Seventeen years after it was withdrawn from U.S. markets, a synthetic version of the active ingredient in marijuana is going back on sale as a prescription treatment for the vomiting and nausea that often accompany chemotherapy, the drug's manufacturer said Tuesday.
http://www.cnn.com/2006/HEALTH/05/16/pot.pill.ap/index.html

[Lochloosa]

1. An Ocologist once said to me...

"Give a person that is puking his/her guts out a pill"

[spanone]

6. The docs told my mother they couldn't prescribe it, but she might

try some marijuana for her chemo treatment or they had a glaxo pill that costs 40 bucks a pill that could help. This pill did nothing, the pot helped. Go figure.

[Canuckistanian]

2. Marinol - good, smoking pot - bad

Didn't you get the memo?

[alarcojon]

29. I was getting blood drawn just yesterday and saw a little

promo thing for Marinol. And this is in a good regional Hospital in Wisconsin, hot Haight/Asbury.

[blm]

3. BEST FOCKING QUESTION I'VE HEARD ON THE ISSUE!!!!!!!!!!!!

Reco.

[TechBear_Seattle]

4. Marijuana has no *commerical* value for Big Pharm

Synthetic stuff that can only be made in a lab, which can be patented and sold for $10 a pill, however....

[SmokingJacket]

21. Precisely.

Gawd, I could spit.

[LostinVA]

31. Bingo n/t

[Oldenuff]

33. Exactly Techbear!

You hit the nail on the head!Watch for Sativex to be approved by the FDA as well.As long as there is a profit in it,all is well.

Shame on the Politicians (dems and repukes alike)who tell us we don't have a right to act responsibly in our own dam* homes.

[GreenPartyVoter]

37. Exactly

[Union Thug]

5. Nailed it. Pot is easy to grow..so BAN IT..but keep expensive

synthetics so the fat-bastards of the world can continue to profit.

[NashVegas]

7. Synthetic Pot Can Be Patented

And we all know that would have tremendous financial value, and *, Cheney, Condi, Rummy and all their friends could add the patent-holder's company to their portfolios. Therefore, financial value=medical value.

[mdmc]

8. k/r

peace

[Canuckistanian]

9. Didn't we just see an FDA report about marijuana?

Something about "no medicinal value" and "harmful substance"?

Has there been some medical breakthrough in the last few months?

[spanone]

12. That is the main thrust of the question in this thread.

It either has value or it doesn't. So I guess as another poster says, if you can patent it it is ok. What utter bullshit, but Americans, other than those suffering from chemo, seem to have no say in their government anymore.

[sofa king]

16. Nothing better underscores "faith-based science" than that report.

It's against the law to even study marijuana without federal approval, so as a result the United States officially knows virtually nothing about it. In 1997 there was only one person in America studying the medicinal properties of marijuana.

So they don't know. But that didn't prevent the FDA from releasing a report that said "we can't find any medicinal value." This type of deception is the cornerstone of the Bush Administration's policy of restoring honor and integrity to the White House. It might best be described as the "lie of the incomplete sentence."

The actual truth is found by completing the sentence: "we can't find any medicinal value... because we didn't look."

[RethugAssKicker]

10. Excellent question.... Never thought of it that way !

[catmandu57]

11. That's exactly the same thought I had

Sooner or later even the dimmest bulb is going to realize we've been given a bill of goods about this over and over.

[spanone]

14. After all these years America still suffers from Reefer Madness

at the suffering of it's people.

[Phx_Dem]

13. I don't trust big pharma..

but I wonder if the reason for it is that weed has other psychoactive compounds like THC-A, CBC and CBD. For chemo tx, they only need the THC.

[phillinweird247]

15. Its the method of delivery....

Smoking is harmful so they say it has no value.
But someone with no appetite can't eat a brownie very easily.
I heard about a THC nasal spray they are working on in europe. You spray it up your nose and absorb all the THC from you mucous membranes.
Would love to try that.
Hemp is such a wonderful plant.

[Phx_Dem]

17. you can put it in pills also.....nt

[Greyskye]

30. if you're puking from nausea, a pill doesn't do much good.

:eyes:

[tridim]

22. Pot works precisely because it has all those extra compounds

The drug companies never tell the public that the side effects of real pot are an additional benefit for chemo patients. From what I've read synthetic THC doesn't work at all.

[Phx_Dem]

24. maybe

but CBC makes you dizzy (CBC is created when the TCH/CBD is exposed to air) and CBD is what affects perception of time--I imagine they do more than that, I read about this years ago.

[Oldenuff]

34. Smoking is better..or at least not as harmful as suggested.

Read the full article here:

http://www.latimes.com/news/opinion/commentary/la-oe-grinspoon5may05,0,7185234.story




Puffing is the best medicine
By Lester Grinspoon, LESTER GRINSPOON is an emeritus professor of psychiatry at Harvard Medical School and the author of "Marijuana, the Forbidden Medicine" (Yale University Press, 1997).
May 5, 2006

THE FOOD AND Drug Administration is contradicting itself. It recently reiterated its position that cannabis has no medical utility, but it also approved advanced clinical trials for a marijuana-derived drug called Sativex, a liquid preparation of two of the most therapeutically useful compounds of cannabis. This is the same agency that in 1985 approved Marinol, another oral cannabis-derived medicine.

Both Sativex and Marinol represent the "pharmaceuticalization" of marijuana. They are attempts to make available its quite obvious medicinal properties — to treat pain, appetite loss and many other ailments — while at the same time prohibiting it for any other use. Clinicians know that the herb — because it can be smoked or inhaled via a vaporizer — is a much more useful and reliable medicine than oral preparations. So it might be wise to consider exactly what Sativex can and can't do before it's marketed here.


A few years ago, the British firm GW Pharmaceuticals convinced Britain's Home Office that it should be allowed to develop Sativex because the drug could provide all of the medical benefits of cannabis without burdening patients with its "dangerous" effects — those of smoking and getting high.

But there is very little evidence that smoking marijuana as a means of taking it represents a significant health risk. Although cannabis has been smoked widely in Western countries for more than four decades, there have been no reported cases of lung cancer or emphysema attributed to marijuana. I suspect that a day's breathing in any city with poor air quality poses more of a threat than inhaling a day's dose — which for many ailments is just a portion of a joint — of marijuana.

Further, those who are concerned about the toxic effects of smoking can now use a vaporizer, which frees the cannabinoid molecules from the plant material without burning it and producing smoke.

As for getting high, I am not convinced that the therapeutic benefits of cannabis can always be separated from its psychoactive effects. For example, many patients with multiple sclerosis who use marijuana speak of "feeling better" as well as of the relief from muscle spasms and other symptoms. If cannabis contributes to this mood elevation, should patients be deprived of it?

The statement that Sativex, "when taken properly," won't cause intoxication hinges on the phrase "when taken properly." "Properly" here merely means taking a dose — by holding a few drops of liquid under the tongue — that is under the level required for the psychoactive effect. As with Marinol, people who want to use Sativex to get high will certainly be able to do so.

One of the most important characteristics of cannabis is how fast it acts when it is inhaled, which allows patients to easily determine the right dose for symptom relief. Sativex's sublingual absorption is more efficient than orally administered Marinol (which requires 1 1/2 to two hours to take effect), but it's still not nearly as fast as smoking or inhaling the herb.

That means "self-titration," or self-dosage, is difficult if not impossible. Further, many patients cannot hold Sativex, which has an unpleasant taste, under the tongue long enough for it to be absorbed. As a consequence, varying amounts trickle down the esophagus. It then behaves like orally administered cannabis, with the consequent delay in the therapeutic effect.

Cannabis will one day be seen as a wonder drug, as was penicillin in the 1940s. Like penicillin, herbal marijuana is remarkably nontoxic, has a wide range of therapeutic applications and would be quite inexpensive if it were legal. Even now, good-quality illicit or homegrown marijuana, which is, at the very least, no less useful a medicine than Sativex, is less expensive than Sativex or Marinol.

[leesa]

18. Because patients are constantly asking for marijuana, but the doctors are

unable to prescribe it. I hear it over and over again in oncology. Marinol doesn't work very well so they usually end up scoring their own pot anyway. It works great as antiemetic, appetite stimulator and mood uplifter.

[Warren DeMontague]

41. Jeez, that sounds like medical value to me. n/t

[Zhade]

49. Sounds crazy, but it may have saved my sanity.

Before - hyperdepressed, usually because I worried about being the best at whatever I was doing and of course couldn't live up to the expectations.

After - new outlook, do things because I enjoy them and not for some distant payoff, happier than I've ever been in my life.

If I believed in gods, that plant would be the reason.

[APPLE314]

19. Follow the money..........

[Scriptor Ignotus]

20. clearly,

the people running the FDA are high.

:hippie:

[ArmchairMeme]

23. Ohhh.....

I must have missed the announcement that the FDA is now a subsidiary of the Pharma Industry.

Now it makes sense why all those drugs that used to be harmful are now just fine. Don't worry be happy.

[TechBear_Seattle]

32. You're being sarcastic, I hope

:hi:

The FDA has been in cahoots with the pharmaceutical corporation for many years, with many FDA officials being selected from among Big Pharma lobbyists and many FDA officials retiring from government work and becoming lobbyists for Big Pharma. Not to mention the fact that many of the current protocols for approving drugs were written by Big Pharma. Look at how many drugs have been relabeled or even pulled as dangerous in the last few years; it is no accident that high profit drugs are being rushed through the approval process with nothing more than the manufacturer's statement that the drug is safe and effective, with very little if any actual government study or oversight.

[SOS]

25. Re: medicinal value

Ambien - insomnia
Valium - anxiety

Cannabis is effective for both conditions. If cannabis has no medicinal value, then neither do these pills.

[OregonBlue]

26. In India they have a product called MODOC (sp?) that is pot resins

with the THC removed. It is sorta like a tootsie roll. It is given to old people and small children that are unable to eat. I tried it many many years ago. It gives you a slight high and makes you ravenously hungry. Also quells nausea.

It's produced in most villages in the mountains and sold everywhere. Made by rolling the plant in the hands, collecting the resin, then treated with a chemical (can't remember but something really common).

Works great for cancer patients. Can't believe it is not sold here. But then again, I can believe that the morals police would not want anyone to get even "a bit" of a high.

[misternormal]

28. Nope, can't get high without a tax stamp... n/t

[misternormal]

27. I remember pot when it was less illegal...

... Or more legal...

When the joke was "I wouldn't smoke marijuana in California man... you can get a ticket for that!"

The government has been looking for ways to control it for years

They can't control it and they can't tax it, because you can grow your own, and enough for your own use in a small space in a relatively short time... The big deal about the pot busts, is... The DEA, in it's zeal to fight the "War on Drugs", can't stop the really dangerous stuff... cocaine, heroine and methamphetamine, et al... So they go out of their way to take the easy busts in an attempt to justify the manpower and resources that they have.

We have tracking gear in the military that can track a gnat's ass if it crosses our borders... I believe that the drug shipments from out of country are not as clandestine as the govt would like us to think...

I say track the plane... It's gonna land somewhere anyway, and when it does, seize the plane, let the pilot go, because he is likely just the mule anyway, and blow up the plane in place... Cut's down on court-time, and the drug dealers can deal with the pilot... Cut the supply line, and the problem at the very least is reduced.

Wakes up from his dream

Sorry, no one made any money... there goes another idea.

[OPERATIONMINDCRIME]

35. I'll Stand On Record As Stating It ABSOFUCKINGLUTELY Has Medicinal Effects

[kestrel91316]

36. Ummmm, gee, I dunno.............. maybe because then

some corporation could make HUGE PROFITS off of it???????

Ya think?????

[Zhade]

38. Because "it's not beneficial" is a lie?

Because it really IS beneficial, and has been known to be for thousands of years?

Sadly, even some liberals fall for that bullshit. I pity them.

[genieroze]

39. Fucking lying hypocrites.

[Warren DeMontague]

40. It has no medical value as long as people can grow it themselves

instead of being charged $40 a pill by a pharma company.

[diamondsndust]

42. I'll stick to the real stuff, synthetic won't stay lit....

and didn't you know that gawd wants us to smoke pot? The bible talks about a "burning bush that pacified the nations".

Of course, I could think of a couple "burning bushes" that would pacify the Nation right now

[CanSocDem]

50. Grass is God's way of saying "Hi" -eom

[Asgaya Dihi]

43. General comments

There's a number of issues people mentioned, I'll see what I can remember of them.

On smoking, no pot doesn't have to be smoked. You can use and if you look at photos of medical users they do use an item called a vaporizer. The active ingredients vaporize at a lower temperature than it takes for combustion so there's absolutely no smoke involved with that method and it provides the same immediate results as smoking would. That's good for chemo patients and such. It can also be eaten in a number of ways, there's whole web pages full of recipes and methods. That's good for chronic pain patients as opposed to immediate need ones.

On the synthetic, part of the problem is that it is just thc. thc works for some things but as someone else mentioned there's a lot more than that in pot. That's why some types make you head high and others body stoned or couch locked, some make you paranoid and some don't. It depends on the type. With some patients the thc works ok, but for others it doesn't have the body aspect that sooths pain and discomfort like an Indica would. I thought the point was to sooth symptoms, not to get them high, so we only use the active part that gets them high? WTF kind of sense is that?

It isn't some magic cure all like some try to make it out to be, but what it does do it does as well as many other drugs on the market. It relieves nausea, sooths chronic pain and helps to alleviate certain disorders involving overactive or misfiring systems since it calms them. Given that even the cancer case against it gets weaker all the time I can't see a single reason why it's still illegal other than nobody makes a billion that way.

[Nostradammit]

44. Vaporizers are the only way to go

if you can afford one and must use the herb. The effect is slightly different, more "high" than "stoned". And it won't make you cough.


Or so I've been told...



Great thread!

[Zhade]

48. It does more than that.

For example, it's a bronchial dilator.

For another, studies (overseas, naturally) have determined marijuana may actually SHRINK tumors.

[Asgaya Dihi]

51. True enough

The aspect of being a bronchial dilator is true, that's part of what I was referring to with relaxing systems. One cause of asthma attacks is that the air passages spasm, it seems counter intuitive but asthma patients sometimes benefit from pot. Others it doesn't help, depends on the cause.

The cancer studies are a great sign of hope, but so far it's more hope than proved. Personally I'm sure there is something to it but if we overstate the case it makes it look weaker than if we stick just to the proved points. Better to have them say it's even better/worse than you said rather than have them think you overstated things.

Here's two articles on the subject if anyone is interested. The first is an article about the tumor studies done a few years ago and refers to the one in the US in `74, and the second is a link to a study done by the same guy who performed most of the US Governments lung studies over the last few decades through the University of California medical department. He says he's pretty sure pot has little or no connection to cancer and it might even be responsible for lower rates, but the press has ignored it for the most part.

http://www.alternet.org/story/9257/
http://www.counterpunch.org/gardner07022005.html

[Baconfoot]

45. I'm not sure I understand why companies wouldn't sell pot

We don't even make our own coffee anymore.
I know how to knit a sweater but I still buy clothes.

I bet Pepsi brand pot would work very well.

Plus it might come with coupons!

That they can't sell it is not the reason it's illegal.
Of course they could sell it.

Who couldn't sell something so effective?

Part of this, of course, may just be my black thumb talking.
:)

[degreesofgray]

46. The war on drugs is a war on common sense

and there is no good reason why marijuana is illegal when tobacco and alcohol are freely available.

[threadkillaz]

47. Marinol and Cesamet huh?

I figured the pharmos woulda gone with a more pseudo-spanish-sounding type name like "weedeva" or "potiva" or something.


lol.