The estimated 1.4 million people currently believed to be growing/using medical cannabis illegally would not be doing so if it didn’t work!
One of GWP’s Cannabis Farms
Although GW Pharmaceuticals (GWP) and the British government have continued to try and convince the British public that Sativex is not cannabis, and that ‘street’ cannabis is dangerous and less effective than industrially grown cannabis, the latest U.K government-commissioned report (2020) admits that although:
‘.. there is robust clinical evidence of quality, safety, and efficacy for licensed [cannabis] medicines, they remain available for only small numbers of patients, and, for some, may not provide as much therapeutic relief as products that patients have grown and prepared themselves, or acquired through other unlawful means. Some cultivators of cannabis for personal use with medicinal intent have spent many years experimenting in search of a product that works best for their own individual needs.’(1).
In other words, the British authorities are deliberately misleading the public. The above citation, which was published on page 113 of the government’s own report (1), makes that clear – so the authorities KNOW that medical cannabis is not as dangerous as they are stating, and that it is nowhere near as dangerous as prescription drugs, or treatments such as chemotherapy. And neither is cannabis as addictive as morphine based painkillers. So why won’t the British government allow us, the people, to have proper access to medical cannabis?
The reason is because it would ultimately allow people to grow and make their own medicine, and as cannabis is capable of treating or bringing relief to many different conditions, it will be the pharmaceuticals that will lose out – big time – and their investors. And that is what the British authorities are trying their utmost to delay for as long as possible, and the reason why they are doing so is because a number of prominent politicians profit personally from Britain’s cannabis industry (see the post, Mother, Can I Trust the Government?).
As such, the authorities are deliberately harping on falsely about the ‘dangers’ of cannabis, spreading notions of ‘contamination,’ and upholding nonsense as scientific truth because they are exploiting the plant for financial gain, and they are doing so at the expense of our health! This is why the 2018 cannabis reform was really introduced: To enable GW Pharmaceuticals peddle their trade abroad legally, not for my health and wellbeing and not for yours either.
GW and other pharmaceuticals involved in the medical cannabis industry, are also trying to differentiate the cannabis they grow from that grown illegally. GW, like others in the industry, describe their cannabis as ‘pharmaceutical grade’ cannabis, as if they are the only ones able to provide good weed (LOL), and derive that sold via the black market as ‘street cannabis.’ Their arrogance is astounding. ANY certified seed, grown in accordance with well-established production rules, will produce top-grade cannabis – even when grown in a shed! It is a PLANT, nothing more!
The illegal cannabis market has been around far longer than GWP, or any other cannabinoid-focused pharmaceutical for that matter, and its knowledge in creating new strains, as seen by the emergence of ‘skunk,’ is second-to-none. Once aware of the medicinal properties of cannabis, many illegal growers turned their attention to developing strains for specific health needs, especially in Canada, the Netherlands, and the U.S. Some of these people have spent decades developing cannabis strains and extractions for many different health needs, and the seeds for these strains are easily obtainable to anyone wanting to grow cannabis (2)- so it is these people, not governments or pharmaceuticals, we have to thank for the numerous strains now available worldwide for different health needs.
People using cannabis illegally for medical reasons in Britain, like in other countries, belong to a respectable community that are serious about providing and obtaining high quality cannabis products to treat their specific health need. In contrast to the government’s very negative and false portrayal of ‘street’ cannabis, patients obtaining medical cannabis via Britain’s black market do not have to visit some dingy, filthy drug den to access their medication, because: (a) most people grow and make their own medicine; and (b) people choosing to buy a medicinal product (rather than grow cannabis themselves), usually buy products from people who share the same medicinal need. This is not trying to deny that there are not any risks involved in procuring cannabis illegally when, for example, buying raw cannabis from those producing for recreational purposes, but these risks are simply not present when buying from someone who is producing cannabis for their own medicinal needs.
The notion of ‘pharmaceutical grade’ cannabis is a ploy aimed at convincing the public that GWP’s products are of a higher quality and safer than those obtained illegally so that they can profit financially. Despite using cannabis seeds that are available to buy worldwide, and employing exactly the same growing techniques that illegal growers have used for decades, companies such as GWP are claiming expertise and a superior product, while also vilifying cannabis grown privately so that they can profit from a plant that should be available to everyone. These claims are, of course, backed by the British government, but the confusion between state departments plus widespread ignorance among lawmakers about cannabis in general can be seen in various reports, policies, and official statements that are often contradictory, misleading, or ill-defined – especially in relation to the medicinal value and quality of illegally grown cannabis.
The notion of ‘pharmaceutical grade’ cannabis is a ploy aimed at convincing the public that GWP’s products are of a higher quality and safer than those obtained illegally so that they can profit financially. Despite using cannabis seeds that are available to buy worldwide, and employing exactly the same growing techniques that illegal growers have used for decades, companies such as GWP are claiming expertise and a superior product, while also vilifying cannabis grown privately so that they can profit from a plant that should be available to everyone. These claims are, of course, backed by the British government, but the confusion between state departments plus widespread ignorance among lawmakers about cannabis in general can be seen in various reports, policies, and official statements that are often contradictory, misleading, or ill-defined – especially in relation to the medicinal value and quality of illegally grown cannabis.
One of the most common themes in official reports looking at the viability of medical cannabis is a notion that illegally grown cannabis is inferior and dangerous. What utter twaddle! People growing cannabis illegally face risks from not only law enforcement agencies, but also their customers who EXPECT something decent or they will go elsewhere!
As such, illegal growers spend huge amounts of time, effort, and financial investment in ensuring a quality product. So, while the U.K government report cited above claims that ‘only products produced by pharmaceuticals can be assumed to have ‘the correct concentrations and ratios’ of cannabinoids, and that ‘using other forms, such as [home] grown or street cannabis, as medicine for therapeutic benefit is potentially dangerous.’ HOWEVER, the same report also recognises that licensed cannabis medicines ‘may not provide as much therapeutic relief as products that patients have grown and prepared themselves, or acquired through other unlawful means’ (3). How confusing! Except it is not: anyone can grow cannabis and make their own medicine – and that is what the British authorities and the medical cannabis industry do not want people to know because it will severely impact their profits!
Cannabis plants grown in pharmaceutical settings, despite current efforts to undermine the safety and quality of those being grown illegally for medicinal use, are no different from what the government terms as ‘street’ cannabis – and that is the truth (in fact they are probably significant weaker medicinally – see following section). While governments orchestrated a doomed war on drugs, many illegal cannabis growers took action on hearing about the plant’s healing properties and using the expertise and knowledge they’d acquired when developing high THC strains, set about creating strains for the medicinal market.Â
As such, the cannabis strains currently used for medicinal purposes globally, were developed by illegal growers both in the U.K and across the world, and the certified seeds of these strains are what are being sold abroad to people with the legal right to grow cannabis. These seeds, which are legal to buy in the U.K, are easily obtainable via the internet or in some medical cannabis outlets that have opened in some UK cities and towns.Â
Cannabis Medicine is Herbal Medicine
There are numerous plants that are known for their medicinal properties, and which can be grown and made into medicine legally. The plant feverfew, for example, is a known herbal remedy for treating migraines, and there is some scientific evidence to support this claim. However, research is inconclusive because unless there is a profit to be made, the finance to research these medicinal options has not been available, and the pharmaceuticals (whose financial investment is essential for research to take place), have historically vilified herbal medicines as ‘quackery.’Â
Herbal remedies are seen as a threat because, unlike pharmaceutical medicines, they cannot be studied and licensed in the same way. And that is why cannabis has been such a challenge to them. To resolve the ‘problem,’ the British authorities changed cannabis law in the UK (2018) to ensure the profitability of the British medical cannabis industry. In doing so, they have allowed cannabis medicines to be marketed by Big Business, but kept cannabis illegal to the vast majority of its citizens.
The U.K Human Medication Regulations state:
- A product is a herbal medicinal product if the active ingredients are herbal substances and/or herbal preparations only.
- A herbal substance is a plant, or part of a plant, algae, fungi, or lichen, or an unprocessed exudate of a plant, defined by the plant used and the botanical name of the plant, either fresh or dried, but otherwise unprocessed.
- A herbal preparation is is when herbal substances [plant material] are put through specific processes, which include: extraction; distillation; expression; fractionation; purification;Â concentration, and fermentation.
- The herbal substance being processed can be: reduced or powdered; a tincture; an extract; an essential oil; an expressed juice; or a processed exudate (rich protein oozed out of its source).
- Â Not all herbal products are medicines, some can be classified as food supplements or cosmetics (4).
Sativex and Epidiolex, unlike pharmaceutical drugs (and the ONLY cannabis medicines available legally in the UK), are both made from (cannabis) plants that are made into herbal preparations, and as such are herbal medicines. This is why “the whole way Sativex is regulated is fundamentally dishonest’ (5), as is the regulation of Epidiolex. These drugs are regulated on the notion that Sativex consists of only two molecules, THC and CBD, and Epidiolex one molecule CBD, when in fact, Dr. Geoffrey Guy, the Chairman of British GW Pharmaceuticals, ‘is on record himself saying … that [Sativex] contains up to 400 molecules’ (6), and this, of course, is the same for Epidiolex because it is a whole plant medicine.
The problem is that the Medicines and Healthcare Products Regulatory Agency (MHRA), ‘and conventional or pharmaceutical regulators are simply not capable of regulating whole plant medicine’ (7). In the meantime, the British authorities have launched yet another deceitful campaign, which is aimed at differentiating ‘pharmaceutical grade’ cannabis from what it terms as ‘street’ cannabis because of its threat to the British and global cannabis industry. It does so by claiming that GW’s methods of standardisation and its rigorous quality control procedures means a better product, when in fact it just means a higher price tag and a less effective medicine than natural cannabis. The truth of the matter is that cannabis is not illegal because it is dangerous or has high risks of abuse, but because it is medicine and, as such, is a cash machine for investors.
Cannabis is medicine. This fact is confirmed by a mountain of irrefutable scientific evidence that has led to global cannabis reform that continues to evolve around the world. In contrast to the U.K, ‘Every other jurisdiction in the world has set up special regulatory procedures around cannabis because it is completely different from pharmaceutical medicines’ (8). Cannabis, in contrast to pharmaceutical drugs, is a botanical plant, and like all botanical plants, it consists of hundreds of compounds. This means that it cannot be studied or regulated like pharmaceutical drugs – and neither can any potential safety issues be evaluated like pharmaceutical drugs. As such, cannabis reform in other countries has included legislation that allows for these differences by effectively removing some of these barriers, thus making it easier for doctors to prescribe unlicensed cannabis medicines, and they have also introduced laws that allow people with a prescription to grow their own cannabis for medicinal purposes. Unfortunately, the British government’s determination to control the U.K’s medical cannabis market means that the opposite is happening in Britain.
In contrast to the UK, the lawmakers in countries where authentic cannabis reform has taken place have acknowledged and recognised the scientific evidence showing the healing properties of the cannabis plant, and there is also widespread recognition that cannabis use is not as dangerous or harmful as once believed. Furthermore, reports from places where cannabis use has been fully legalised, such as Portugal and Canada, show that the rate of young people using cannabis has declined (quite significantly in some places), rather than increasing, and so has drug-related crime (9). And the number of people using medical cannabis is growing globally at a tremendous rate, especially among people with life-threatening diseases such as cancer.
These medicines, however (like those confiscated from sick children at the UK’s borders in 2018), all contain THC, and that is something the British authorities do not want legalised. Why? Because the plant’s true healing power comes from THC – not CBD – and any authentic reform would enable people to grow and make their own medicine.
References:
- The UK Review of Medical Cannabis (2020), p. 113.
- It is not illegal to buy cannabis seeds in the UK, it is illegal to plant them.
- UK Gov. Report: ‘Cannabis: The Evidence for Medical Use‘Â (2016), p. 78.
- The Human Medicines Regulations (2012).
- The Independent (2017): ‘There is Legal Marijuana in he UK: So why is it hard to get off?‘
- Ibid. The Independent (2017).
- Ibid.
- Ibid.
- Online article: ‘Why Cannabis Retailers are Good Neighbours‘ (2021).
