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Marijuana Shows Great Potential in Dealing with MS

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It might be time for you to start explaining marijuana as “a harmful, addictive, opiate based killer that ruins lives.”  The concept has labored well for legal opiate based pain relievers.  Citing marijuana’s actual medical qualities has been doing little to pressure the federal government to do something.  But new pain relievers, like the terrifying Zohydro, easily obtain the eco-friendly light in the Food and drug administration despite alerts from leaders within the medical area.  Even as patient recommendations and clinical research flows in highlighting the positive impact of medicinal marijuana, we’re stuck waiting around the federal government bodies meet up with the relaxation from the electorate.

A week ago, the American Academy of Neurology launched new recommendations regarding the management of ms.  MS could be debilitating and effective remedies have alluded doctors for a long time.  With the possible lack of consistent effectiveness around the party from the traditional remedies, many patients happen to be made to seek complementary and alternative medications (CAM).  There’s formerly not been much when it comes to research concentrating on the prosperity of CAM remedies, until lately.  The American Academy of Neurology is finally searching to alter that.  They lately launched their findings with different overview of 291 studies and research which involve CAM remedies for MS patients.

Lead author from the review and clinical director of Or Health insurance and Science University’s Ms Center, Dr. Vijayshree Yadav, stated “This may be the first review, evidence-based recommendation, on treating MS with CAM treatments.”  He continued to state “there were 29 different treatments incorporated within the recommendations.  19 studies checked out cannabis.”  The types of cannabis intake analyzed, however, were using dental cannabis extract and artificial THC.  Scientists discovered that these remedies were good at treating discomfort for approximately twelve months, but didn’t address the tremors frequently connected with MS.

Losing effectiveness continues to be credited with other conditions given synthetic marijuana.  Patients who’ve used medications for example Sativex have regularly reported benefits that rapidly dissipate.  When we would inject good sense as it were, it appears an all natural type of Sativex, say naturally growing marijuana, would without doubt be safer on our bodies.  MS scientists don’t have many details on using actual marijuana because they are mostly avoided by federal law to review real cannabis.  This research is among many read about this highlights the advantages of marijuana.  It really makes a person question if our chosen authorities are reading through, or if they’re even literate.

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Dr. Sanjay Gupta Not Only Apologizing For Previous Stance on Marijuana

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Marijuana patients and activists have been disappointed regarding the across the country known Dr. Sanjay Gupta’s sights on Cannabis. For a long time he appeared to dismiss the numerous patient recommendations and lots of studies carried out highlighting the advantages of medicinal marijuana.  Dr. Gupta has considerable affect on established medical community, and federal policy (he’s a detailed ally of Leader Obama and it was offered a situation within the Whitened House).

About eight several weeks ago, Dr. Gupta required the initial step to redeeming themself within the medicinal marijuana community.  He accepted he didn’t consider all the details and authored articles entitled “Why I transformed my thoughts on weed.” Dr. Gupta stated he was sorry for adding to “misleading” the general public on marijuana   It had been an excellent gesture and assisted the thought of legitimate medicinal marijuana gain much more traction. Then he dug much deeper on medicinal marijuana in the CNN documentary “Weed”.
Dr. Gupta has taken the redemption farther.  The other day he stated he was “doubling lower on medicinal marijuana.Inch  The phrase grew to become overused throughout 2012 election season, but continues to be encouraging to listen to from Dr. Gupta.  In the brand new article, he discusses the government government’s patent on cannabinoid treatment.  Many of medical marijuana’s detractors have no clue exactly that the us government has acknowledged the effectiveness of cannabis, while still declaring they haven’t.  Confusing, we all know.  Clearly, the final and diminishing group in Congress who keep towards the old speaking points don’t truly understand what their government has acknowledged.
This hypocrisy wasn’t lost on Dr. Gupta.  In his article he said However, this specific problem still bothers me: “Just how can the federal government deny the advantages of medicinal marijuana even while it holds a patent for individuals exact same benefits? People from the Fda rejected my repeated demands to have an interview.”  Although the marijuana community and Dr. Gupta departed to some rough start, it appears he’s seriously interested in as being a reliable ally now.

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Marijuana Remains Illegal as the Federal Government…

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Approves a terrifying new opiate based medication.

The federal government maintains that there are no known medical benefits to marijuana.  The actual evidence tells a different story as the FDA continues to choose financial bliss for big pharma over the safety of Americans.  While opiates (one of the main components of heroin) are highly addictive, both physically and mentally, they enjoy more legally friendly status when compared to marijuana.  Medications such as Oxycontin and Vicodin are costing America in both lives and tax dollars.  Emergency room visits related to overdoses cost billions per year, a bill that is picked up by working Americans.   The situation has become a known epidemic, with medical leaders calling for action.  Even the White House considers the current situation a pandemic.  This would lead one to believe that the FDA would never approve newer and more dangerous opiate based medications.  That would be false.  The FDA has recently approved Zohydro, a more potent opiate based pain killer.  CNN described this as “frightening” and Dr. Andrew Kolodny, president of the advocacy group Physicians for Responsible Opioid Prescribing said “It’s a whopping dose of hydrocodone packed in an easy-to-crush capsule…It will kill people as soon as it’s released.”  The FDA, of course, responds by saying the medical benefits outweigh the risks.  Of course marijuana’s virtually zero mortality rate could make a better argument for the “benefit outweighing the risk” argument.  Zohydro is said to be fives times more powerful than Vicodin.

Does not approve more funding for marijuana’s potential to treat Alzheimer’s.

Alzheimer’s impacts the lives of approximately 5.1 million Americans.  Since the symptoms can come on gradually, the disease can remain undetected for sometime.  This makes calculating definitive numbers difficult.  This condition cuts the quality of life short for many who physically are fine, but mentally suffer from dementia.  Gary Wenk, a longtime Alzheimer’s researcher has noticed a trend, especially as those who smoked marijuana in the 1960s are now at the vulnerable age.  “We found out that people who smoked dope in the 1960s were not getting Alzheimer’s.”  While his research is promising, it has unfortunately been brought to a halt.  He recently said “I am not funded to do marijuana research…It costed me about $100,000 to do a whole experiment, $10,000 just to buy the molecule and every old rat is $150. You can see how things add up and individuals can’t afford these things.”  It appears that their may be some promise for cananbinoids treating and preventing Alzheimer’s, but no one can be certain since the federal government will not open the door for more testing and research.  Besides the obvious financial benefits to reforming marijuana laws (marijuana.net has spoken about incarcerations, tax revenues, war on drugs, etc.) Mr. Wenk pointed out that money could be saved in medical treatment.  “If we can keep a person out of a nursing home for five years, we’ve saved that family and their insurance companies an awful lot of money… No matter how we spin this, old people are going to win.”

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Marijuana Enters New Age, While Propaganda Remains Stuck in Last Century

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Research into marijuana was almost non existent for the 20th century.  In the 21st century, clinical trials are finally being commissioned, trying to make up for decades of lost research time.  Blatant propaganda had previously been a staple for the criminalization crowd, those who wish to see our jails overcrowded with non violent criminals.  However, as positive patient testimonials, the realization that the war on drugs is a colossal failure, and a desire to regain some individual choices take hold on the American public, wreck less propaganda has begun to fade away.

 

The self righteous criminalization crowd now realizes they have to be more covert when trying to mislead.  They may troll the internet for vulnerable comment sections on blogs, or share exaggerated or factually incorrect articles on social media.  It came as a huge surprise to us to see vintage propaganda prominently featured on the Kansas City Star’s webpage.  Proving that so much deception could not be successfully crafted by one person, both Ravikumar Chockalingam and Dragan Svrakic needed to collaborate to complete a recent article titled “The risks of marijuana are many”.

The article starts with the following:

Imagine the public outrage if a toxic drug was approved without any regulation for “recreational” use in adults and children that suppresses the immune system, causes schizophrenia, mental illness, brain and lung disease including cancer and death. Also, many long-term and frequent users of this toxic drug have lowered IQs, impaired memory, poor judgment and diminished driving ability.

 

It does not exactly improve from there. The authors go on to cite marijuana as a “toxic drug” while ignoring obvious comparisons to legal opiates and alcohol’s “toxic” effect.  Even stranger, they try and scare readers regarding a fictional “nightmare health scenario” that other states outside of Kansas and Missouri are experiencing.  Driving and marijuana is actually a discussion that needs to occur, but there is conflicting evidence to suggest that it causes more accidents.  In fact, in certain states where medical marijuana is legal, DWIs and fatal crashes have actually gone down. The authors also claim there is no medical evidence to support marijuana’s medical efficacy.  That is incorrect as even the U.S. government has commissioned studies that highlight marijuana’s wide array of medical uses, including the potential to fight cancer.

 

Of course the article also uses the standard condescension, where patient testimonials are irrelevant and we should not trust people when they tell us about their improved quality of life and reduction in pain, nausea, PTSD, seizures… the list goes on.  Patients from different walks of life, politically, financially, and ethnically, all have gotten together during times where their health has deteriorated, to fake marijuana’s benefits.  At least this is what the article in the Kansas City Star implying.

 

While (psychiatry resident) and Dragan Svrakic (associate professor) are both part of the Washington University School of Medicine, they seem to be lagging behind the medical leaders in our country.  Even Dr. Sanjay Gupta, CNN contributor and President Obama’s choice for Surgeon General (Dr. Gupta turned down the offer) has reversed his opposition to medical marijuana, and admitted he was wrong.  When leading physicians, clinical trials, and patients all report the benefits of medical marijuana, we can only hope the two authors of the article will take notice.  We at marijuana.net noticed an unusual amount of blanket statements and a lack of evidence provided for these outrageous claims.  The American public does not seem to be buying the scare tactics of last century as the vast majority (85% according to a Fox News Poll) of residents here support medical marijuana.  It may be time for Ravikumar Chockalingam and Dragan Svrakic to abandon the propaganda, or at least utilize more subtle and modern techniques.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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The finish is nigh? Feds claim forget about interference with condition marijuana laws and regulations

end prohibition

The cost from the fight against drugs continues to be well recorded. The majority of us understand the rising violence south in our border, patients influenced by insufficient access, people imprisoned for possession, and also the expense of prohibition towards the tax payer. We at marijuana.internet wrote about this for a while now.

We’ve learned about these problems again and again, without a whisper of the sensible response from the us government. Just whenever we all increased fed up with the legal stalemate with federal government bodies attempting to hold condition law under control, it seems a significant alternation in federal policy might be going ahead.  Last week, the Justice Department introduced it wasn’t likely to prosecute marijuana crimes legal under condition law.  While the best objective of reform activists might be reclassification, this might indeed be federal government bodies waiving the whitened flag.  Paul Armantano of NORML stated “It certainly seems to become potentially “the start of the finish”  in relation to its prohibition.

The timing from the DOJ statement is curious because the agency was asked for an approaching forum on medicinal marijuana and repairing condition versus. federal law.  Eric Holder was asked towards the conference and lots of were searching toward getting him obvious in the murky waters that represent  the Whitened House’s stance on marijuana.  Single questions about marijuana have demonstrated hard for Holder and the staff to reply to formerly.  They have stated lack of knowledge towards the research while concurrently declining to confess marijuana was less destructive than heroin along with other opiates.  Perhaps a congressional Q&ampA with follow-up questions wasn’t going to talk about well for that already battling Attorney General.

The general public has significantly transformed their position on marijuana, and they’ll not soon be returning towards the times of “Reefer Madness”.  The new policy direction means a lot of things if federal government bodies maintain their word.  Many companies and traders happen to be waiting for some indication that they’ll ‘t be jailed for joining the most popular growing industry.  Patients might have more bit of mind when attempting to gain access to medication.

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Marijuana Inudstry News August 30, 2013

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World Drug Study: Marijuana Most Popular, Opiates Most Fatal…

The first ever global study on substance use was recently completed.  The study included data from surveys conducted around the world in 2010.  The goal was to measure substance use rates for marijuana, cocaine, amphetamines, opiates, and others.  Marijuana proved the most popular substance surveyed across the world and opiates proved to be the most fatal.  Men in their 20s had the highest rate of abuse worldwide.  The U.S, Australia, Britain, and Russia were the countries with highest substance abuse rates.  Some of the data was may not be conclusive but “we can say definitely that there are drug problems in most parts of the world,” said Theo Vos, of the Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation at the University of Washington, the study’s senior author.

 

For more on this story click here

 

Mexico City Considers Marijuana Legalization…

Since his departure from the Mexican presidency in 2006, Vicente Fox has been one of the most high profile and outspoken advocates of marijuana legalization. He even has said he would grow cannabis if legalized.  With the human and financial casualties taking a huge toll on Mexico, support for major marijuana reform has been growing steadily.  Now the discussion has escalated even further in Mexico City where legalization could soon be on the way.  Mexican lawmakers have recently been debating legalization of marijuana and other substances in order to regulate and save money.  Half of the marijuana consumed in the U.S. is believed to originate from Mexico.  There are now many seeking to tax and help Mexico’s struggling finances.  Additionally, legalization could help reduce the violence.  Over 100,000 people have either been killed or have gone missing since 2006 because of cartel activity.  Next month a final forum will be held by government leaders in Mexico City.   Though it is not clear that the result will be legalization it seems like more and more of a possibility.

For more on this story click here

 

Utah Mom Seeking Medical Marijuana to Treat Son…

There has been a growing trend of desperate parents who have no choice but to turn to marijuana as their only hope of providing a quality of life to their ailing children.  Recently there was a high profile case in New Jersey where parents pleaded with Governor Christie to allow the use of medical marijuana for their child who struggled with an extreme form of epilepsy known as dravet syndrome.  Governor Christie did change the state law so the child could receive care.  This week we learned of another mother in a similar situation.  Jennifer May is a Mormon from Utah who has run out of treatment options for her 11 year old son.  He too has dravet syndrome.  Ms. May, a self identified republican initially felt that administering marijuana to children was a crazy idea.  Unfortunate Utah has not passed a law permitting medical marijuana.  Jennifer May has now been pushing to change that.  She recently said “We don’t think it’s a cure, we don’t expect it to be a miracle. It just needs to be something we can try for our kids that don’t have anything left.  I want to see if this can even give my child a quality of life for a few years.”  Utah is known as a very conservative state where legal medical marijuana previously seemed like a long shot.  Her story is gaining traction however, and could possibly become a rally point for medical marijuana support in Utah.

For more on this story click here

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Senator Patrick Leahy Organizes Federal Conference on Marijuana Policy

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Federal Authorities Refuse to Admit Marijuana less Dangerous than Alcohol

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Last week, we at marijuana.net were pleased to report on Attorney General Holder’s decision to alter the way federal minimum drug sentences would be handled.  This week we found out it may have been a case of the Lord giveth, the Lord taketh away.

The momentum for marijuana reform has been rising steady so it was right on cue that federal authorities needed to fight back with false and ridiculous propaganda.  On Monday, the National Institute on Drug Abuse (NIDA) released a statement that not only calls into question their grasp of the facts,  but also questions whether or not the agency is operating in 2013 and not 1933.  On Monday decision makers at the NIDA thought the following statement was a well thought out idea: “Claiming that marijuana is less toxic than alcohol cannot be substantiated since each possess their own unique set of risks and consequences for a given individual.”  The statement seems to be a response to the group Marijuana Policy Project’s (MPP) recent ads that describe marijuana as less dangerous than alcohol.

Mason Tvert of MPP commented on the odd NIDA statement by telling Huffington Post “Our federal government has been exaggerating the harms of marijuana for decades, but at this point it has gone off the deep end…NIDA’s statement that marijuana can be just as toxic as alcohol would be on par with the FDA announcing sushi is as fattening as fried chicken.”  The Huffington Post article also pointed out that PolitiFact was unable to identify a single marijuana related death in 2010 but found 41,682 linked to alcohol during the same year.

The public trust in federal drug policy has been declining for decades.  However, the feds have learned to smile, dress nice, and say little when questioned on these issues.  NIDA’s mission statement is “to lead the nation in bringing the power of science to bear on drug abuse and addiction .”  Their actions indicate that perhaps the NIDA does not hold its mission statement in any sort of high regard.  As we said last week with Dr. Sanjay Gupta’s reversal on medical marijuana, how do we trust those who have policy making influence when they are the last to be educated?

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Eric Holder Tries Patchwork Fix For Federal Drug Sentencing

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Many of us have heard the outrageous examples of rapists and murderers serving less time in prison than low level marijuana and drug offenders.  To some,  this is just an odd quirk or a glitch in federal policy, a conversation that will soon find it’s way to back of our minds,  buried deep in the abyss of our sub consciousness, well below the layer our daily stresses.  To others, this is a broken family, this is children growing up without a father, this is the realization that your teen’s mistake in college could ruin the rest of his or her life.

The Obama Administration had initially vowed to fix the broken state of drug laws.  He and now Attorney General,  Eric Holder signaled an end to the War On Drugs,  or at least a drastically different approach.  The two indicated that going after the medical marijuana industry would not be an effective use of federal resources.  Apparently, what they meant was that we were not spending enough on attacking medical marijuana patients.  Less than one year through his second term,  President Obama enjoys the unique status of pursuing legal action against far more collectives than the Bush and Clinton years combined.

Perhaps feeling the sting of broken vows, an over saturated corrections system,  and an economy that remains barely in gear, has finally led to policy change.  Yesterday Mr. Holder announced a change in sentencing on a federal level for low level drug charges and that he wishes to circumvent “draconian mandatory minimum sentences.” Small cases that accompany mandatory federal sentences will be shifted to the states.  In regards to the states handling more of the cases,  Mr. Holder said “Some issues are best handled at the state or local level…And that’s why I have directed the United States Attorney community to develop specific, locally-tailored guidelines – consistent with our national priorities – for determining when federal charges should be filed, and when they should not.”

The change is certainly welcomed but it may be comparable to placing a Flintstones band aid over a large fatal wound.  Mr. Holder and federal authorities are basically conceding that federal drug laws are out of control and is not in line with the majority of American’s wishes.  Specifically, a large portion of the public wants marijuana to be taken off as a schedule 1 substance.  Instead of fixing the issue and reclassifying,  Mr. Holder will run from the laws he oversees.  Additionally,  shifting the responsibilities to the states only works if they do not operate under similar ” draconian law”.  Otherwise, those states could require additional funding.  Will this deadlocked Congress, that initially decline Storm Sandy victim relief be willing to designate additional funds to state level drug cases?

There may some optimism to take out of Mr. Holder’s actions.  This is the first time in quite a bit that the federal government is making a significant policy change in low level drug offenses.  Could this be setting up for future maneuvers and a reconciliation of state vs. federal laws?

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Fighting for Democracy on This summer fourth Weekend

july 4th

Once we celebrate out nations independence,  we are constant reminded that democracy only stays intact if people fight.  Many activists within this country are fighting for marijuana reform.  Also, you will find individuals in energy fighting frantically to help keep things as they are.  Hopefully you like the weekend and look for the updates below.  As always,  please be secure.

Arkansas Attorney General rejects marijuana legalisation ballot


Town of Berkeley Fights back against Federal effort to shut law abiding dispensary

Activists Pushing for Governor to sign medicinal marijuana bill made to bring relief to Illinois patients

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