Upstream | January 22, 2012 | 85 comments

Pot-based prescription drug could receive FDA approval

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KB723
By Muriel Kane
Sunday, January 22, 2012

A British pharmaceutic firm is completing clinical trials of a drug derived directly from marijuana and hopes to receive approval to market it from the Food and Drug Administration by the end of 2013.

The drug, which contains both THC and cannabidiol, has already been approved in Canada, New Zealand, and several European countries to relieve muscle spasms associated with multiple sclerosis. In the US, however, it would be sold to relieve cancer pain.

The FDA began approving drugs based on synthetic equivalents of the active ingredients in marijuana in 1985, but this would be the first drug derived from the plant itself. This is significant because, as the Associated Press points out, “The U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration categorizes pot as a dangerous drug with no medical value, but the availability of a chemically similar prescription drug could increase pressure on the federal government to revisit its position.”

“There is a real disconnect between what the public seems to be demanding and what the states have pushed for and what the market is providing,” the president of the International Cannabinoid Research Society told the AP. “It seems to me a company with a great deal of vision would say, `If there is this demand and need, we could develop a drug that will help people and we will make a lot of money.’”

Some marijuana advocates, however, worry that government approval of marijuana-based prescription drugs could become a new argument against legalization of medical marijuana. “That’s the race against time,” Kris Hermes of Americans for Safe Access told AP, “in terms of how quickly can we put pressure on the federal government to recognize the plant has medical use versus the government coming out with the magic bullet pharmaceutical pill.”

http://www.rawstory.com/rs/2012/01/22/pot-based-prescription-drug-could-receive-...

"Legalize It!!!!!!"
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85 comments // Pot-based prescription drug could receive FDA approval

  • Medicated_Minute
    • 0
      Medicated_Minute  

    • How does this look to our nation while our citizens are sitting in prison's and/or jails with cannabis related crimes? What about the US patent? Is this the another side or other part of the US and it's foreign patent for cannabidoil? What do you think?

    • 4 months ago
  • MotherForTruth
  • pjacobs51
  • GavinTheMother
    • +1
      GavinTheMother  

    • They will legalize anything....as long as Big Pharma gets paid. They have medical cocaine and heroine (by other names of course) but legalizing a plant? No way. Unless it comes in the form of an expensive pill. Then it's ok.

    • 4 months ago
  • TheAmbivalante
    • +2
      TheAmbivalante  

    • I feel sorry for this pharma company as they are falling into the hands of the evil gateway drug, marijuana. I'm sure we'll see them all hooked on heroin and crack within days...

      I'd bet the farm that a pro-pot candidate could take the White House.

    • 4 months ago
  • GRC54
    • +2
      GRC54  

    • I don't know about most of you but I'm sick and tired of a bunch of stiff collard stone faced white rich guys, and I include all those paid in full doctors, who run our drug policy for the profits they will make by keeping marijuana a class one substance. I'm tired of listening to doctors say it's bad for you as there are more drugs out there that are less harmful for humans. Can anyone show me a less harmful drug than pot? If you find one that does what pot can do medically I tip my hat to you as you will become one of the elite. That is if big PHARMA will let you apply for and hold the patten for it if they don't put you in jail first.

    • 4 months ago
  • GavinTheMother
  • Georgia_Jim
  • cabinettags
    • +5
      cabinettags  

    • The more gains in approval and acceptance, world wide, the stronger our U.S. position in advocating the use and legalization of marijuana. No doubt our fed govt and their deep pocket sponsors will continue to bury their head in the sand far beyond what's rational. Our key to success, as I see it, is to NEVER give up. Keep plugging. Keep putting it in their face. Keep pointing to more rational societies that have changed their laws yet didn't go to hell. Keep getting those signatures and putting it on ballot. California should try again, and again, and again, and keep trying.

    • 4 months ago
  • PressCore
    • +3
      PressCore  
    • cabinettags:

      That's the spirit, bro. Never give in to the bought dogs of mobsters. All
      Americans pride themselves as being citizens of a law abiding country.
      Our American Heritage gives us the moral right, duty, and obligation to
      throw off the yoke of tyrany criminaly imposed by oppressors anywhere.
      Their phony law is Historicly built on a platform constructed out of bribery
      mendacity, and Organized Crime. The true story of how Prohibition got
      started is so sordid and corrupt that all people everywhere need to be
      made aware of it. It's biggest flaw exists in that it doesn't comply with the
      consent of the governed, & by Lincoln's advocation, is illegitimate per se.
      It's a disgrace that should have been repealed long long ago. Were it not
      for Nixon, a disgrace in and of himself, it likely would have been. California
      will arrive at it's destination eventualy. The central reason why Democracy
      is a slow process is because it's meant to be permanent. We don't need
      trolls blocking out path, then trying to sell us the right of way which was
      always ours to begin with.

    • 4 months ago
  • Truthitswhatsfordinner
  • Frosty46
    • +7
      Frosty46  

    • Liquor is quicker--to bring on stupor! The Alcohol Lobby owns our government, or at minimum a great part, and they will never give up power to the citizens to grow anything that could compete with their drugs of choice----------

    • 4 months ago
  • EmperorThan
  • PressCore
    • +4
      PressCore  
    • EmperorThan:

      http://U.S.la

      That proposed extremist bill was the brainchild of one of the jackasses
      who proposed SOPA, I think. Did you know that ? Because it interferes
      with the Soverignty of other nations, and the Soverignty of U.S. citizens
      it's of extremely doubtful legality per se, likely won't pass or be signed
      into law. One of the reasons why it's so outrageously in conflict with all
      the legal principles of settled law is that many States have Medical MJ
      laws, and MJ Decrim laws. By Federal law ( 14th Amendment ), we are
      all citizens of the States in which we reside, and entitled to their equal
      protection & equal Justice. Eg I'm a citizen of New York which was settled
      by Dutch people. My dad's mom was from the Netherlands. I aim to
      emigrate back there to my ancestral home, apply for dual nationality
      to become a citizen of the Netherlands also, which is legal under U.S.laws.
      Yet I'll still own a home in New York, and will be back here to live part
      of the year. None of those extremist jackasses will ever live to see the day
      when they'll terrorize me with threats of malicious criminal prosecution
      for simply taking my meds. It's my choice to take natural herbal medeicine,
      not their's.

    • 4 months ago
  • corndog67
  • KB723
  • Johnny_Los_Angeles
    • +5
      Johnny_Los_Angeles  

    • And this is what it is all really about..... a weed anyone can grow at home for free is suppressed so you cant so that big corporations can make alot of money off of you.... there already is a u.s. pharma version approved. Do you know that in 2011 new laws were passed so that you cant grow anything on your property and eat it or sell it? Or that you cannot collect rainwater on your property and do what you want with it? Do you know that big corporations are buying up all the natural drinking water sources in the world just so they bottle it and sell it to you?

    • 4 months ago
  • KB723
  • Truthitswhatsfordinner
  • attilatheblond
  • KB723
  • bailey78
    • +5
      bailey78  

    • Yep the drug companies now have BlackWater working for them so they can push their Man made crap on us. They will always have a reason not to set the Herbs Free

    • 4 months ago
  • KB723
    • +4
      KB723  
    • bailey78:

      Heck they are out there fighting a Fake War for profiteers... We can grow our own anyways.... Who wants to smoke or pick through seeds and stems??? I always enjoy Fresh Greenery the first Puff is always worth writing Home about... =)

    • 4 months ago
  • cmc101
  • KB723
  • jimstoner
    • +3
      jimstoner  

    • http://www.cbsnews.com/ New Pot Pill for Chemo Patients. When you get to the site, go to their search bar and enter New Pot Pill. The story is actually from February 2009. I didn't notice that till just now. It must have taken longer to get into production for U.S. sale than they expected.

    • 4 months ago
  • KB723
  • jimstoner
  • KB723
  • jimstoner
    • +2
      jimstoner  

    • The drug is called Cesamet in the United States and is being sold by Valeant Pharmaceuticals. It will first be prescribed to chemotherapy patients for nausea and vomiting control. Sales are to begin in the next two to three weeks. It is exactly the same drug that the F.D.A. approved in 1985 for Eli Lilly that was called Nabilone. Eli Lilly withdrew the drug at the time for what they called "commercial reasons". Valeant Pharmaceuticals, a Costa Mesa California, company bought the rights to Nabilone from Eli Lilly in 2004. Valeant currently sells the drug here in Canada under it's original name of Nabilone.

    • 4 months ago
  • KB723
  • PressCore
    • +4
      PressCore  

    • I wouldn't give a rat's ass for it's chances of being accepted by the
      community of those inflicted with the maladies only legitimate God
      Natural ganja cannabinols can treat effectively. These cockroaches
      are behind Prohibition and the infamous drug wars that keep MJ
      illegal so that it will tempt patients to try their snake oil bogus pills.
      Me. I'll be emigrating to the U.K of the Netherlands, & to Switzerland
      after I've bought my home in N.Y. to come back to in the Spring.
      Over there I can get the real thing, cheaply, and thumb my nose
      at all the maniacs who support Prohibition, the drug wars, and
      Big Pharma. They won't be getting any of my bread. And they
      won't be making me suffer as they won't be making me their
      guinea pig to study as a Corporate slave. Fuck them to Hell.

    • 4 months ago
  • KB723
  • Incredulous
  • KB723
  • PressCore
    • +3
      PressCore  
    • KB723:

      Thanks for the suggestion, amigo. I intend to. I've lived in Colorado before
      in the 1970s, and I plan to return once I have some real money behind me.
      Still the atmosphere I want to live in for periods longer than long visits is one
      where I don't need a doctor's script. As the Mexican bandido said in the Bogart
      movie Treasure of the Sierra Madre: " Badges ? We don't need no stinking
      badges ! I feel the same way. I like the Aldous Huxley approach much better.
      If you want to experience Mescaline, you chew on a Petote cactus button.
      Besides, over there I can smoke or even inhale Hashish. That's a consistently
      smoother, higher energy high than simply taking pot luck ( pun intended).
      When I was in college, we knew people who got their ganja direct from Jamaica.
      (And blond hash oil from Lebanon.) It was so dark green it was black, and
      we had to smoke it in glass pipes, but WOW was it awesome. One toque
      and you're in the stratosphere in seconds. THAT'S what I miss. They still
      have it in Amsterdam. That & King Farook hashish & a placid no fear mindset.

    • 4 months ago
  • KB723
    • +2
      KB723  
    • PressCore:

      Yup... I knew that, hence I welcomed you back... Sounds like you know where to feel at home, always feel free to come back to the Mile High City, chances are, I may still be around... =)

    • 4 months ago
  • Incredulous
  • KB723
  • Incredulous
  • KB723
    • +1
      KB723  
    • Incredulous:

      Oh I know, been here all my life... It would surprise many to know that I myself was a bronc and bull rider til I was 17.... Still a Bad Ass with a rope as well... I should post a video some day.... =)

    • 4 months ago
  • Incredulous
    • +2
      Incredulous  
    • KB723:

      not surprised at all...and you should post that video!

      Last time I was in Steamboat I took a train back to Chicago with my other sister. Not too crazy about long train rides, but I swear, if you are ever going to take a train anywhere in the US, Colorado is the place to do it. We came down and around the mountain into Denver at night, and the lights were awesome....felt like we were rolling into Oz.

    • 4 months ago
  • KB723
    • +1
      KB723  
    • Incredulous:

      I just may... The video I took was on my phone but Hell I have been roping since I was 2 and a half years old... Something you never forget... I am sure I could take a better video, In fact I sent bailey78 that phone video in a text message... Colorado is a great place to live, I think Steamboat could be pricey, but I guess that depends on what kind of work you do.... =)

    • 4 months ago
  • Incredulous
    • +1
      Incredulous  
    • KB723:

      I think it is pricey, but my sister bought her place years ago, before real estate prices escalated off the charts. They are freaking religious about their yards in Steamboat....it is a sin not to water, which, given the rate of droughts lately, having a lawn you have to water seems like the real sin to me.

      The funniest thing I ever saw in Steamboat is a small strip of land on what looks like a stream, with a restaurant that they call "The Yacht Club." Steamboat got nearly 500 inches of snow a couple of years ago, and I have never seen a yacht anywhere in landlocked Colorado....so clearly, they do have a sense of humor. The Yacht Club closed in 2009, but it was legendary with the locals.

      so send me a note when you put that video up....don't want to miss it!

    • 4 months ago
  • KB723
  • PressCore
    • 0
      PressCore  
    • KB723:

      Oh, the first place in Colorado I'll be visiting is Denver, KB723. Mile High city
      was my original home there. No doubt I'll be back, thanks. Colorado is a place
      I feel at home in too, being a Westerner.

    • 4 months ago
  • Anonmaly
    • +3
      Anonmaly  

    • I just don't like the government giving one corporation licensed use of their cannabis patent (a patent by law was no grounds for existence...).

      It's all about the money, actually giving anyone or group license to use or distribute is pretty unfair and rather UnAmerican....

    • 4 months ago
  • KB723
  • PressCore
    • +2
      PressCore  
    • Anonmaly:

      Bingo. The entire reason why they enacted Prohibition was to extort 100
      times what it's price was while it was legal and cheap during the Depression.
      It's no secret that the uberrich bootleggers turned their investments into
      legitimate businesses after prohibition of alchohol ended. That they unduely
      influenced the Congress of their time to outlaw it to keep profits high. That
      Big Pharma can't make any money selling the real thing because you can't
      patent Nature. So the bastards pretend they have anyway to pretend they
      have a handle on the complex array of cannabinols existing in Cannabis
      products in their natural form with the cola buds, resins, even the shake.
      It all about Organized Crime and Organized Big Pharma manipulating their
      markets to manipulate prices by using the Government like a ratchet wrench.
      It's all about the Benjamins, yes indeed. They have such a stranglehold
      on legitimate businesses that if the Rackets can't make their money drops
      noone makes any moves.

    • 4 months ago
  • jimstoner
    • +3
      jimstoner  

    • If you were a leader of a drug cartel, or even the leader of a large drug smuggling and drug dealing enterprise in North America, or even big pharma for that matter, and you had two politicians standing in front of you. One was trying to legalize marijuana, and the other was trying to maintain the war on drugs. Which one of them would you give a campaign contribution to?

    • 4 months ago
  • KB723
  • PressCore
    • +3
      PressCore  
    • jimstoner:

      Obviously, the one ranting as an extremist maniac hell bent on drug war jihad.
      Keeping it criminalized is the only way the mob can make money, and the
      only way the political sleezoids can make their kickbacks. It's absolutely no
      different today than it was during Prohibition of Alchohol. They've simply
      substituted Juarez for Chicago, innocent victims for the guilty & corrupt
      perpetrators competing for the big bucks.

    • 4 months ago
  • jimstoner
    • +2
      jimstoner  
    • PressCore:

      I was listening to a radio talk show one day and the conversation was about legalizing marijuana. A very upset woman called in and she was convinced that the push for legalization was coming from the drug dealers. I could not fathom the logic.

    • 4 months ago
  • Conniepae
    • +2
      Conniepae  
    • jimstoner:

      Legalization would put the drug dealers out of business, by taking away their profits. They would no longer be needed. I don't think the drug dealers would be the one's pushing for legalization. Just sayin ....

    • 4 months ago
  • Truthitswhatsfordinner
  • jimstoner
  • Leen61
    • +2
      Leen61  

    • KB, this country will never let this happen because of big pharma and the phoney war on drugs that keeps standing in the way.

    • 4 months ago
  • KB723
    • +1
      KB723  
    • Leen61:

      Ahh, that's Ok... This story is about the British, I just hope it will lead to a world wide difference of opinions on just how Stupid we can be, to criminalize something that is Free, and has soo much to offer... Perhaps we should burn the Constitution that was written on Hemp Paper...

      Forget about all of the other things Hemp is good for... Perhaps Stop cutting down our Forests, maybe find a way to use it's oil for energy... Hmmm, maybe even a cure for Cancer... I am Amazed at how short life is these days, and how many have the power to deny a person medicine, or that they seem to think they will live forever, or how this passes from generation to generation, I think we are an ignorant people, honestly I really don't know what else to say....

    • 4 months ago
  • Leen61
  • KB723
  • Leen61
  • KB723
  • Leen61
  • KB723
  • jimstoner
    • +4
      jimstoner  

    • I hope this isn't Marinol again. They tried a marijuana based drug called Marinol a few years back, and it failed miserably. It did not have the same effect on the appetite as marijuana, and did virtually nothing to calm muscle spasms. What it did do was give patients an intense feeling of paranoia, for sometimes, two days.

    • 4 months ago
  • KB723
  • jimstoner
  • KB723
  • jimstoner
  • KB723
  • jimstoner
  • KB723
  • kbshana
  • KB723
  • cmc101
  • KB723
  • cmc101
  • KB723
  • FoosMaster
    • +1
      FoosMaster  

    • I am still waiting for California or another state to start their election year push for Legalization. Support continues to grow and this could be the year.
      LEGALIZE!!!

    • 4 months ago
  • KB723
    • +1
      KB723  
    • FoosMaster:

      Legalize Indeed, I was watching something the other day that stated 70% of the American Population sees nothing wrong with Marijuana, I guess the only ones that do are the folks that look to call it 'Their' Property, to make a Buck or Two.... =(

    • 4 months ago
  • FoosMaster
  • KB723
  • EmperorThan
    • +3
      EmperorThan  

    • I hope any endeavor helps to destigmatize the poor image the public has from years of propaganda and cartel association. It's time for us to legalize nature. I don't use marijuana but nature should ALWAYS be legal.

      People who think drugs are bad need to realize drugs are inanimate objects. Drugs can't do anything, people do things not drugs. The faster we realize that the faster we can get to the heart of drug problems. And the faster we legalize drugs the faster we can LIVE UP TO the talk of being the freest nation on Earth.

      But so long as we can't travel to Cuba and we can't do whatever we want with our own bodies with other consenting adults then we definitely shouldn't be able to say we're the freest nation on Earth. That honor goes to so European country lol

    • 4 months ago
  • KB723
    • +2
      KB723  
    • EmperorThan:

      I agree, why criminalize what the GOD they always mention when it suits there need, has left for the people... This story is however about a Pill, so it will have Big Pharma in the picture... =(

    • 4 months ago
  • KB723
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