Cannabis Compound Said To "Halt Cancer"

h.ross.perot informs us of research out of the California Pacific Medical Center Research Institute suggesting that a compound found in cannabis may stop breast cancer from metastasizing. Cannabidiol, or CBD, could develop into a non-toxic alternative to chemotherapy some years down the road, if animal and human trials bear out its effectiveness. The article notes that smoking cannabis will not deliver significant quantities of CBD.

Less talk, more action.

[sherriw]

My mom had breast cancer several years ago. The treatments are just horrible, but I'm thankful she's still with us. It seems however that once a year we hear about some potential breakthrough or another. Well, with the truckloads of donations going to 'breast cancer research', I'm getting a little sick of hearing about 'potential' breakthroughs. I want something we can start using right now. It's hard to be patient when people you care about are sick or dying. I hope some of these possibilities pan out soon.

Re:Less talk, more action.

[Firethorn]

The problem with what you hear is that 99% of these potentials fail some point along the way. Either they're too toxic in the human body, or not effective enough against cancers for their toxicity, or just not competitive with existing treatments(no niche to exploit).

I heard once...

It's very easy to kill cancer cultures in a dish. Matter of fact, much of the time the trick is keeping them alive.

It's an entirely different matter to do it in the body.

Makes sense to me. A little splash of bleach and that petri dish won't have any live cells in it. Yet bleach is NOT suitable for internal use.

Don't get me wrong, I hope these possiblities pan out as well. Even with all the failures, we've come a long way.

Estimating Risk

[PIPBoy3000]

Basically everyone I've known who has died, has died of cancer. It drives me crazy that we're spending hundreds of billions of dollars to avenge the deaths of 3,000 people, while under four billion is spent on fighting cancer, which kills half a million people each year. It reminds me again how terrible people are at estimating risk [schneier.com].

References:
NCI budget [cancer.gov]
Cost of Iraq war [msn.com]
cancer deaths [forbes.com]

Re:Are you sure? Or are you blowing smoke.

[Anonymous Coward]

I was waiting for someone to make a comment like that. How do they know that delivery by smoking doesn't include enough CBD when they haven't even finished trials using their own CBD-like (or CBD extracted, didn't read the article) chemical? It sounds pretty much the same as what GW Pharmaceuticals claims. You know, smoking isn't a good delivery method, but our product is. Even though it's a 100% pure plant extract. They have a point, but they put so much spin on it, trying to make it sound like it's not marijuana. It is.

I have no reason to believe that this is any different. Just a way for pharmaceutical companies to claim that it isn't marijuana (to the righteous right), while also managing to fuel the fight on drugs, which in this case is a direct (and much cheaper) alternative to their medication. The other reason I believe this is that there is already anectdotal evidence that smoking marijuana does have some kind of effect on cancer, and not just brain cancer.

Don't get me wrong, I do want to see new and better (and hopefully cheaper, but I doubt that will happen) treatments for breast cancer. My girlfriend has breast cancer, and just finished chemo. Considering how much hell it was for me, I can only imagine how hellish it was for my girlfriend, and that isn't even mentioning that they had to remove the entire breast because it was too big to be just partially removed. But it REALLY pisses me off when pharmaceutical companies pretend like they are 100% going out of their way to help the patients, when in reality they're working hard to keep a lid on marijuana which has some down right positive uses. (Actually, most of the uses, even recreational uses, are positive if you ask me. Only a small percentage of usage is actual abuse with adverse effects, and even that is not entirely to blame on weed alone.) When my girlfriend was going through chemo, I wanted her to use marijuana. The side effects of chemo she was experiencing were text book examples, many which could be eased or eliminated by smoking marijuana, even in doses that won't create a high. But alas, she thought it was too risky (we live in a country where you can get into a LOT of trouble for having weed) and I didn't feel comfortable in strongly suggesting it further if she wasn't comfortable. So there she went through 6 months of pure hell.

I hate the gov'ts of countries that seem to think they're doing someone a favor by criminalizing marijuana (and a long list of other things), but I even hate the pharmaceutical companies that put spin on their new weed-breed amazing drug that of course only they could make, using a patented process on a plant that is practically a common weed. Disgusting.

Re:Let's stop jailing people who smoke it.

[BVis]

I can't think of a single reason why it should be a crime to grow & smoke.

You probably don't have a vested interest in tobacco production, pharmaceutical research, nutritional supplements, petroleum production/distribution, cloth manufacture... etc.

A recent scientific study proved that it is not a so-called "gateway drug" that leads to e.g. heroin abuse.

There you go, bringing your silly "facts" into the argument again. It's bad! End of discussion.

George Washington grew it on his farm, what could be more American than that?

Technically, GW grew hemp, which, while being the same species as marijuana grown for intoxication purposes, is bred in such a manner that getting high from it is physically impossible due to low THC/other psychoactive content. I know it's a fine point, but let's not give the prohibitionists another nit to pick.

In the bible _kana_bith_ (cannabis) is mentioned as a component of the sacred incense that was burned in the temple. Shouldn't freedom of religion protect people's right to grow it?

Try telling that to the Rastafarians, who have consistently been told they have no religious right to grow a controlled substance. Nevermind that the 'christian' church uses intoxicants on a regular basis in their worship; that's different because they're 'christian', not one of those hippy blasphemous un-American cults.

All that being said, eventually it will be legal, once people figure out that we have more important things to worry about. (Not holding my breath though..)

that's bullshit

[circletimessquare]

look at taxol and the yew tree for breast cancer treatment

what the pharma companies do is substitute a methyl group for a hydrogen somewhere, or mix the chemical with some other chemical, patent that, and call it vastly superior, even if it isn't

just look at celebrex: it's just an NSAID. nothing that aspirin can't handle. but they modified the chemical slightly, patent that, the effects are slightly different, but the slight effects are relabelled massive and brilliant improvements in function, and you have a market

they do it with the opiates too: see oxycodone

false dichotomy

[circletimessquare]

we could spend that money on education too, or healthcare for the middle class

we don't. we think it's valuable to our security to get rid of saddam hussein and democratize iraq. is that right? is it wrong? certainly, it could be the stupidest thing the usa has ever done

but therefore, you need to defeat the money spent on that operation based on that rationale alone, within the confines of the merits or lack thereof of that operation by itself

but comparing the money spent on that to money to be spent on some other worthy concern is stupid. nobody thinks like that and gets anything done in this world

Re:I volunteer

[Plutonite]

I thik there was an episode of "Oz" where a mobster got breast cancer, and tried to keep it secret.

That's friggin hilarious. Even more hilarious is the fact that you're using the mobster who got breast cancer in Oz as some sort of reference.

I *heart* slashdot.

Re:What form of Cannabidiol

[GeckoX]

Problem is, almost no studies are done on this particular subject...good luck getting government funding to do so.

Common sense states that your average pot smoker smokes a lot less pot than your average cigarette smoker smokes cigarettes, so there's a starting point. Further, a LOT of chemicals are used in the manufacture of your typical cigarette.

There are a ton of starting points for reasonable research to be done, but alas, it won't be any time soon. Without doing research unfortunately, we simply can not know what affects the compounds in cannabis have on the human body.

we need socialized medicine - universal healthcare

[circletimessquare]

frankly, it's an embarassment that the usa doesn't have this. all arguments against universal healthcare are not just morally bankrupt, they are logically bankrupt. if you accept the notion that everyone in a rich country should have good healthcare, socialized medicine falls logically into place

even from just a callow economic point of view, in terms of the cost of preventive care (what you get with socialized medicine) versus the costs of emergency care, it is cheaper

what is the system we have now? a more inefficient and wasteful bureacratic way to get a less quality system

or we can just let middle class people go bankrupt when they get cancer, and leave tons uninsured

it's such bullshit, the state of healthcare in the usa

It'll never be legal (in the States)

[kcdoodle]

I used to think that it would be legal by the time I was thirty.

I high school (circa 1977), at least 70% of the kids smoked regularly or occasionally.
25% didn't care if anyone smoked it and only 5% were against it. (These numbers are all personal observation so take with a grain of salt.) The point is -- I was a geek, I occasionally did imbibe, I didn't care if anyone else smoked all day long.

Fast forward a couple decades. Those same pot-heads are now republicans and swear that they never, ever smoked pot. In fact they believe it is immoral to do so. And anyone who does should be thrown in jail. Amazing how raising kids changes your perspective.

I believe that alcohol is far worse than pot to your body and to society as a whole. BTW, I quit smoking pot years ago, but that doesn't mean you should.

Re:This comes up every few years

[dbjh]

Could you be so kind to cite your sources? "They" doesn't sound very convincing. You suggest Cannabis has a permanent effect on cognitive skills. If true, that would be *major* news.

flat out wrong

[circletimessquare]

with all the waste a government system obviously means, it is still far better than an equally wasteful system, that only cares about profit, that doesn't insure everyone

i am not stumping for universal healthcare as some sort of nirvana, i am saying it is the less worse of two evils

all of the negatives you can throw at me about universl ahealthcare, i agree with you 100%

and it's still better than what we have now

Re:Let's stop jailing people who smoke it.

[OutSourcingIsTreason]

I don't suppose you can quote chapter and verse about the Bible thing?

Cannabis is mentioned in Exodus 30:23.

Re:Bad article summary!

[JCSoRocks]

It's good to see so many people have done research to make sure that pot smokers can get high safely. Now if only we had time for those poor sods with *real* diseases...

No real answer. Thanks anyway.

[dbjh]

Thank you for your reply, but it didn't help much. You wrote:

In the case of MS they found that yes it helped with pain but over time it worsened some symptoms such as balance and cognitive skills.

The CNN article you linked to does not mention any negative effect. It was just not clear if there was any measurable effect. You made it sound like Cannabis can have a permanent effect on cognitive skills. BTW who is talking about Cannabis being the next miracle cure here?

Thank the USA's 'war on drugs'!

[FatSean]

Making pot use a felony offense drives alot of people in many ways. If you want more time spent on "real" diseases, get the gov't to lay off pot. Otherwise, STFU and GBTW.

Re:This comes up every few years

[misanthrope101]

I'm just tired of it being presented as a snake oil cure for everything when it isn't.

I'm tired of people claiming that medical marijuana proponents claim that marijuana cures everything, when in fact they don't. You're making a sensible, supportable position--that marijuana can help with a wide variety of conditions--and turning it into a caricature, then objecting to the caricature you've made as if it's the position people actually hold.

Cue the tin foil hats about how this is a conspiracy from the government/Big Pharms.

If people are working in concert to do something they shouldn't be doing, that meets the textbook definition of a conspiracy. Government used fraudulent data and scare tactics to ban marijuana, and "Big Pharma" supports them in this--that isn't "tin foil hat" material. You're caricaturing a reasonable position, one backed up by well-documented facts, and then spewing your contemptuous bile at your own caricature, once again pretending that it's the position people actually take.

Re:Thank the USA's 'war on drugs'!

[cromar]

We're like most anyone else. We get angry when it's called for.

Re:I volunteer

[Cajun Hell]

So why is it illegal?

People will quote the special interests against it, but there's a bigger reason that dominates them all, and makes racism and the chemical company lobby fade into the background. That reason is: attitude about government.

Americans still overwhelmingly think the purpose of government is to implement whatever good ideas come up, and solve our problems. That's why this particular article is political: people are talking about the presence of useful compounds inside the plant. People talk about how harmful it is, how harmful it isn't, etc, as though the utility of the plant, or its side-effects, actually matter.

As long as you engage in discussion of the merits (or lack of merits) of the plant, in the context of whether or not it should be illegal, you lose. There will always be arguments against anything, whether its heroin or hydrogen hydroxide, that the material is harmful to the user. There's nothing on this earth that is provably safe.

The debate should always be about who owns people, not the decisions that the owner makes. Is it the government's decision on what people should ingest, or the people's decision? People, stop citing the plant's advantages, and start talking about the real political issues. Don't ask "why is this illegal?" Ask, "How is does local gardening fall under the intent of the 'interstate commerce' clause?" Ask, "Why do voters in Texas have a say in Vermont citizens' health?"

Re:Bad article summary!

[caffeinemessiah]

You just fired off a bunch of things that COULD be wrong with the studies. That's like me saying that your parents could have been the ones who assasinated JFK. Its not really based in fact

In science, if something *plausible* COULD be wrong with a study, it deserves to be analyzed before the study is assumed to be rigorous. This also applies to studies on the other side, i.e. the ones which claim marijuana cures death and stops global warming. In your analogy, you can't possibly give me any plausible evidence that my parents killed JFK. I pointed out a rather common methodological flaw (check the literature) with using self-reporting in smoked marijuana studies.

Look, I agree that people CAN cook cannabis and they SHOULD use a vaporizer if they want to smoke it. However plenty of people do smoke it in bowls. In fact I'd bet money that In the United States, most people smoke it without using a vaporizer. Even more people smoke it then cook it.

Would you say there's an honest culture of information about cannabis in the United States? I wouldn't. I don't know if you're being sarcastic or not, but I'd be all for a campaign to educate people on the safe use of marijuana. In the Netherlands, most coffee shops stock a vaporizer and a lot of Dutch people I've talked to would prefer to use a vaporizer. Ultimately, people will probably still smoke cannabis because of the social bonding aspect, but they should be educated about the alternatives. After that, it's a choice you make for yourself.

In case you were NOT being sarcastic, here are some websites that advocate safe marijuana use:
safer choice [saferchoice.org], regulate [regulatemarijuana.org], marijuana uses [marijuana-uses.com] (not really an organization, but an emeritus harvard professor who's studying the positive uses of marijuana)

Bad study

[bpkiwi]

Have you read that study? They took 17 people with collapsed lungs or emphysema, all of whom smoked on average six joints a day over a period of more than eight years and also consumed cigarettes on a daily basis for nearly 12 years. They then said that tests were unable to show which substances had caused the lung damage.