WeedLife News Network

Legislation to legalize cannabis at the federal level recently proposed by Sen. Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) and a group of Senate Democrats is long overdue. While it aims to fix injustices done to communities of color that have been most harmed by the war on drugs, it excludes one very important demographic: patients.

The bill is presented as “comprehensive” cannabis reform. It makes cannabis legal in the United States for recreational use and has many provisions for expanding the cannabis industry. It also adds taxes that provide revenue to the federal government and stipulates that some of the money collected be used to enhance the lives of communities that have been most hurt by the failed war on drugs.

Leaving out patient care overlooks the largest group of people who will or may be affected by this new law.

An estimated 115 million Americans over age 50 will develop one or more illnesses such as osteoarthritis, anxiety, insomnia, or cancer that are treatable with cannabinoid medicines. Not providing for them in the discussion draft underscores that lawmakers are not paying attention to the needs of patients, the ways in which patients differ from recreational users, and the ways in which a recreational paradigm does not support needed clinical care.

First, legislation should decouple medical and recreational cannabis. While legalization of recreational cannabis may address the needs of healthy people, it does not address people’s medical needs. People need competent care based on sound science that is aligned with the same fundamental values that apply in all areas of medicine, including respect for patient choices through informed consent, beneficence through sound medical advice that ensures patients benefit while minimizing harm, issuing exact prescriptions to ensure that patients get the right medicine, and justice by ensuring that everyone is treated fairly and all have the same treatment opportunities.

As more states are legalizing recreational and medical cannabis across the United States, the cannabis market is growing.

But as more people consume cannabis, potential adverse events to the plant are becoming evident, including cannabis allergy.

What Is Cannabis Allergy?

Some cannabis consumers may suffer from a cannabis allergy, which is a body reaction to the cannabis plant. It has recently become relevant because of recent legalization in the U.S. and Canada.

Although the study on cannabis allergy is still in its infancy, we can outline its most relevant characteristics.

Cannabis sensitization is not so rare. Humans can be allergic to almost anything, and it is even possible to have multiple allergies. People may be exposed to hempseed hidden in foods and drinks. However, they may also suffer from sensitization by inhaling, smoking, touching, and eating cannabis.

Jazz Pharmaceuticals subsidiary GW Pharmaceuticals has announced it has received approval in the UK for the use of Epidyolex to manage seizures associated with tuberous sclerosis complex (TSC).

Tuberous sclerosis complex is a rare genetic disease causing benign tumours to grow in the brain and on other vital organs. Among its many impacts where the condition is severe are seizures and impaired intellectual development. The seizures are often resistant to conventional therapies.

Usually diagnosed in early childhood, the number of people living with TSC in the UK is estimated between 3,700 and 11,000.

GW Pharmaceuticals’ cannabidiol-based Epidyolex (known as Epidiolex in the USA) is already in use in the UK for seizures associated with Lennox Gastaut syndrome (LGS) and Dravet syndrome. In September last year, the Australian Therapeutic Goods Administration (TGA) approved it here for the same indications.

The UK Medicines and Healthcare Products Regulatory Agency (MHRA) has now also approved it for TSC as an adjunct therapy to be used in conjunction with clobazam (a benzodiazepine class medication), for patients two years of age and older.

CALGARY -- The death of 15-year-old Mia Wilkinson has rocked her family and friends, the teen girl passed away suddenly on August 12.

“It really hits home and it's gut wrenching,” said Kendra Myhre, a long-time friend of the family.

“I am so upset and hurt and devastated.”

Mia was diagnosed with Ohtahara syndrome when she was a baby, which causes her to have severe seizures and sometimes she could have up to 100 episodes every day. When Mia was about seven years old, her mom Sarah explored cannabis oil and it changed Mia’s life.

Since then, Sarah has worked to educate and counsel other families about the benefits of cannabis for children who suffer from severe seizures.

London, UK, Aug. 16, 2021 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- Link Reservations Inc. (OTC Pink: LRSV) (the “Company”), a provider of medicinal mushroom and cannabidiol (CBD) wellness products for both humans and pets, announces its LinkResPet and DailyLifeCBD products will be available for purchase in all four retail locations of Collins Tobacco & Vape Stores. This comes as the Company looks to expand its presence across the marketplace and increase consumer awareness of its pet and human wellness products.

Rene Lauritsen, Link Reservations Inc CEO, commented: “We are very excited to have our products in all four Collins Tobacco & Vape retail locations. In the next few months we hope to continue this growth and have a stronger presence in retail locations across the U.S. and eventually in the Europe and the UK. This is a great way to increase product awareness amongst consumers who are already interested in CBD products but haven’t come across our products before. Retail presence for us is clearly a key driver of sales as we look to grow our market share. I look forward to updating investors on any further developments”.

LinkResPet’s products consist of CBD tinctures for dogs and cats. While DailyLifeCBD has a functional mushroom and CBD range of products including its DailyLifeCBD Immune tincture, as well as other CBD products in the pipeline. All products are made with the highest quality hemp oil and are lab tested, THC and GMO free. The hemp oil used in LRSV products comes from organically grown certified U.S. and European hemp. The Company ensures that its products undergo a rigorous process of quality control and testing using the latest scientific methods.

Collins Tobacco & Vape has been in business 12 years and has four locations in Miami & Miami Beach. These are 6750 Collins Ave Miami Beach, 2611 Collins Ave Miami Beach, 1711 N. Bayshore Dr Miami (Grand Hotel) and 2504 NE 2nd Ave Miami.

For more information about LinkResPet or to purchase CBD products for pets, please visit www.linkrespet.com or follow us on Twitter @res_pet

Cannabis farmers tend to aim for high THC content cultivars of weed when they’re creating a new strain, without giving much thought to the effect these compounds have on the user’s body.

The potency of cannabis is determined by the content level of CBD and THC compounds present in the plant. So, it is normal to be curious about the exact amount of THC and CBD present in a cannabis product before smoking.

In the last decade, hundreds of new strains of cannabis have been created giving smokers a wide range of options to choose from. No two strains of weed can offer exactly the same characteristics. The taste and aftereffects of each cultivar will be distinct from one another.

This has caused a deviation from the normal cannabis culture practiced in the ’70s and ’80s. Back then there were fewer cannabis cultivars and everyone had an idea of the amount of THC and CBD present in them.

Now, THC and CBD content levels have risen and can be as high as 30% in a weed product, with extracts having very high levels of CBD or THC compounds.

A notification to FDA by Charlotte’s Web to demonstrate the safety of its full-spectrum hemp extract was met with objections in a letter made public Wednesday, underscoring regulatory challenges plaguing the hemp-based CBD market in the U.S.

The development highlights Congress must intervene to clear a pathway for hemp-based CBD products, several industry executives said.

“This is just simply a clarion call for the passage of legislation to provide a legal pathway for the sale of CBD,” said Jonathan Miller, general counsel to the U.S. Hemp Roundtable, in an interview.

GW Pharmaceuticals hurdle 

Charlotte’s Web (and others) cited material differences between its full-spectrum hemp extract and the CBD drug known as Epidiolex, the latter of which FDA approved in 2018. Yet FDA concluded the new dietary ingredient (NDI) from Charlotte’s Web is excluded from the definition of a supplement because CBD was first authorized for investigation as a new drug.

“Looking at the totality of the record, FDA has concluded that your NDI 1202 is a CBD product and thus is subject to the exclusion from the definition of dietary supplement” under U.S. law and “may not be marketed as or in a dietary supplement,” wrote Cara Welch, acting director of FDA’s Office of Dietary Supplement Programs (ODSP).

The North Carolina Senate is considering Senate Bill 711, The Compassionate Care Act, which would legalize medical marijuana in this state.

The sponsors say this act would give North Carolina the strictest medical marijuana law in the country.

Below are some questions and answers about who could get medical marijuana and how a medical marijuana law would be implemented if S711 becomes law.

This information is current as of  early August 2021 and is subject to change. The latest version of S711 is available at the N.C. General Assembly website.

Rules for patients

How would someone qualify to get medical marijuana?

Thanks to the passage of the 2018 Farm Bill, CBD containing less than 0.3% of THC (the psychoactive component of marijuana) is everywhere. And hemp seed oil in products has been around for decades. But aren’t CBD oil and hemp seed oil the same thing? Not quite.

While both are derived from the cannabis sativa plant and both are legal at the federal level, they are more like cousins than identical twins. Unfortunately, the terms are sometimes used interchangeably or in misleading ways in advertising. Often, both are misnomered as “hemp oil,” which neither truly is. Let’s clear things up.

Hemp Seed Oil

Hemp seed oil is derived from the seeds themselves and does have some potential health benefits, including an ideal ratio of rich fatty acids. These omegas may help with cardiovascular health by reducing the speed of plaque buildup in the arteries along with lowering blood pressure. Hemp seed oil is also frequently promoted as a beauty ingredient, benefitting skin, hair and nails. Hemp has long been grown for its fiber and industrial uses.

CBD Oil

CBD oil utilizes the stalks, leaves and flowers of the plant and is usually cultivated for its high concentration of CBD (cannabidiol), one of the compounds found in the cannabis sativa plant. Unlike hemp seed oil, CBD directly affects the endocannabinoid system (ECS), a recently discovered system in the body that helps regulate many other systems.

CBD oil, along with other compounds from the plant, is promoted as having the potential to help manage anxiety and depression, reduce stress, promote alertness and focus, improve sleep quality, boost mood, relieve pain, reduce inflammation and reduce the occurrence of epileptic events.

Hemp, Inc. (OTC PINK: HEMP), an established leader in the industrial hemp market, is pleased to see top-level athletes embracing CBD as part of their training programs.

Effective Jan. 1, 2018, the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) removed CBD from its list of prohibited substances. The change allowed athletes to incorporate CBD into their training regimes for the postponed 2020 Tokyo Olympic Games.

Competitors in the delayed 2020 Summer Games, including softball outfielder Hayley McCleney and hurdler Devon Allen, are among those who utilized CBD products in the runup to the Olympic competition.

The Summer Olympics were in Tokyo, Japan, through Aug. 8, 2021. However, Japan’s strict anti-cannabis laws don’t permit athletes to take hemp products across international borders.

“It’s quite frustrating that I can’t use them to compete on the world’s biggest stage,” Rapinoe said.

Replacing your alcohol addiction with a weed addiction is not the way to wean yourself off of alcohol. Here are some potentially helpful insights as to why.

The other day I stumbled on a post on Reddit written by a former booze hound who switched to cannabis to quit drinking.

The post went like this:

I quit drinking about 16 months ago, but I immediately started smoking more pot. Then I started vaping the high-concentrate waxes and shatter, and drinking tonics that are 100mg THC per bottle. I was putting massive amounts of THC in me. So, obviously, I was sober from booze, but not addiction-free because I was doing THC. If you do this- watch out- I quit the THC a few months ago and had major depression for a couple weeks afterwards. People say there is no withdraw from pot- they are trying to sell pot to you, or they just don’t know. There is withdraw, and it is NO fun. I’m sure the severity varies from person to person. So if you do pot, I’d recommend small doses! I have since quit.. once a month maybe I’ll smoke some flower. (Pot is legal in my state) – Reddit

While it’s good that the Redditor in question managed to wean off high doses of weed, and essentially break the cycle of addiction, it’s important to note that while weed can help you quit alcohol, it can also fill the space that the addiction to alcohol created.

We continue to see several conflations and misconceptions voiced in the discussion about microbial safety standards for cannabis products. The foundation for these misconceptions is the idea that cannabis testing regulations should mimic the food industry. We reject this idea because cannabis flower has two major departures from food: it contains high concentrations of antibiotics and it is dried and inhaled.

Cannabis Flower Contains High Concentrations of Antibiotics

As much as 20% of cannabis flower weight/volume is made up of cannabinoids, which are potent antibiotics. We have not seen any food on the market that is 20% (weight/volume) antibiotic.

Furthermore, each cannabis cultivar has a unique combination of cannabinoids and each cannabinoid has its own antimicrobial spectrum. For example. THC has different antibiotic properties than CBD and CBG. So one can assume that each unique flower chemotype creates a unique matrix that will affect the resulting colony counts. An effect not dissimilar to the one we observed when comparing different culture media.

Failure to purify these antibiotics from solution during homogenization will result in chemotype to chemotype variation and require each chemotype to be validated for microbial counts. This is daunting and no one in the cannabis industry is doing this despite it being well known that if the matrix changes you must revalidate. This lack of purification seen in plating methods is a weakness not seen in molecular methods that purify the sample before enumerating DNA molecules.

Additionally, because the cannabis flower’s natural antibiotics are packaged into trichomes, it is only when samples are aggressively homogenized that they are allowed to alter the microbiome on the flower. This effect is not seen by cannabis consumers who simply vaporize a non-homogenized flower sample, which means the test is not representative of what consumers experience.

Psychedelic drugs such as psilocybin and LSD can induce an experience known as oceanic boundlessness, which is characterized by a feeling of oneness with the world and a sense of awe. New research, published in the Journal of Psychopharmacology, provides some preliminary evidence that high doses of cannabis can also produce this type of altered state of consciousness.

“Once the psilocybin labs started emphasizing that oceanic boundlessness seemed to be the mechanism underlying the molecule’s antidepressant effects, nearly every cannabis fan couldn’t help but ask, ‘Hey! Doesn’t marijuana have comparable effects?'” said study author Mitch Earleywine, a professor of psychology at the University at Albany.

“My students had already shown that ‘challenging experiences’ were common when folks ate more edibles than they intended to. Asking folks if they thought cannabis also produced these oceanic boundlessness effects seemed an obvious next step.”

For their study, the researchers used Facebook and Amazon Mechanical Turk to recruit a sample of 852 cannabis users, who completed an anonymous survey regarding the most dramatic THC experience of their lives. The survey included items from the oceanic boundlessness subscale of the Altered States of Consciousness Scale, a scientific questionnaire that is frequently used in psychedelic research.

Earleywine and his colleagues found that nearly 20% of participants reported a score on the oceanic boundlessness subscale that was above 60% of the maximum. People who report a score this high are considered as having had a “complete” or “breakthrough” oceanic boundlessness experience.

Written By: Andrew Ward.

Mexico could become the third nation to legalize cannabis after its Supreme Court ruled cannabis use and possession laws were unconstitutional, decriminalizing it in June 2021. The decision came after several deadlines were not met by Congress, prompting the court to take action.

Cannabis reform continues to make incremental reforms. In 2017, lawmakers approved a medical bill. The following year, Grandview Market Research valued the market at U.S.$47.3 million with a nearly 28% CAGR until 2025.

Still, concerns remain. Mexico's market experienced substantial setbacks due to legislative delays since legalizing medical in 2017. A framework for the medical market was released in January 2021. As of August, would-be operators remained in limbo regarding adult-use licenses.

Despite the significant hurdles, analysts and operators tell Benzinga that the market is poised to be a global leader.

Diabetic nerve pain patients in Pennsylvania registered for the state’s medical cannabis program have been invited to join a study.

Diabetic neuropathy is a form of nerve damage that can occur in diabetes patients. The condition can range from  numbness or tingling in the extremities, or a burning, sharp, or aching pain. An estimated 47% of patients with diabetes in the USA have some form of peripheral neuropathy.

Clinical research organization Affinity Bio Partners last week announced it had launched a clinical study in Pennsylvania for registered medical cannabis patients suffering from diabetic nerve pain. However, Affinity Bio Partners didn’t offer anything in the way of detail in its announcement as to what the study involves specifically. Serena Group was also mentioned as being involved in the study, but no luck there either in terms of additional details at this point in time.

All that is provided is a phone number – 724-859-6200 – and email address – research.pgh@serenagroups.com “to check enrollment eligibility at no cost.”

“I am so excited to be working on this clinical study with Dr. Bryan Doner and the Serena Group,” said  Affinity Bio Partners CEO Christina DiArcangelo. “The future of medical cannabis and cannabinoids as medical treatments are dependent upon properly performed clinical studies. It is time for companies to invest their money into performing clinical studies that prove safety and efficacy regarding their products.”

When Fresh Green, the first medical marijuana dispensary in the Kansas City area, opened in October, one eighth of an ounce of flower cost $60. Nearly 10 months later, the same product can go for as low as $40.

Prices for medical marijuana have been dropping across Missouri as more manufacturers, cultivators and dispensaries open. As the market continues to grow, those in the industry say to expect the cost of cannabis to continue decreasing.

Missouri residents voted to legalize medical cannabis in 2018. Since then, the state has licensed 193 dispensaries, 59 cultivators and 86 manufacturers, though not all are in operation yet. But as the industry began to find its footing, scarcity of product begot higher prices.

“Certainly, we knew when stores opened here at the very beginning the prices were going to be higher, the selection was going to be more limited,” said Jack Cardetti, spokesman for the Missouri Medical Cannabis Trade Association. “But with each coming week, we see those trends reversing.”

Along with lower costs, consumers have access to more products than before. When dispensaries in the area first opened, they sold only flower. Now, they stock a variety of items, including edibles and cartridges.

Warsaw, Poland: The use of herbal cannabis is associated with marked improvements in a patient with treatment-resistant stuttering, according to a case report published in the journal Cannabis and Cannabinoid Research.

A team of investigators affiliated with the Medical University of Warsaw (Poland) and with Hannover Medical School (Germany) presented the case of a 20-year-old male patient with refractory stuttering. Following the daily administration of vaporized plant cannabis, the patient exhibited sustained improvements in speech fluency and also reported benefits to his overall quality of life. The patient did not report any adverse side effects from cannabis over the one-year observational period.

Authors reported: “[T]his is the first case report of a patient suffering from impairing and treatment-resistant stuttering, who markedly improved after treatment with medicinal cannabis. Based on patient’s self-report and reports of family and friends, as well as several established assessments, use of cannabis resulted not only in an improvement of stuttering but also remission of (social) anxiety, and reduced depression and stress, as well as improved sleep, attention, concentration, self-confidence, social life, and overall quality of life without any side effect. Importantly, treatment effects did not decrease over time.”

They concluded, “Medicinal cannabis could be effective in treatment of refractory stuttering, but these preliminary data have to be confirmed in controlled studies.”

While this is the first case report specific to the efficacy of cannabis in the case of a patient with a stuttering disorder, several prior studies have documented the ability of THC to improve symptoms in patients with Tourette Syndrome.