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| Marijuana Proven Effective in Treating Cancer |
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Posted by CN Staff on October 18, 2009 at 05:24:42 PT By Dave Stancliff, For The Times-Standard Source: Times-Standard 
USA -- Marijuana opponents in the federal government are up against the wall and the wall is crumbling. The feds have fought marijuana use for decades, disregarding its medicinal applications, in a senseless war against the herb. The demonized killer weed is turning out to be anything but that. As myths about this ancient herb are dispelled, scientists are using it to treat everything from chemotherapy-induced nausea to different cancers. In August, The British Journal of Cancer published the results of a study that found THC (the main active component in marijuana) is effective in fighting prostate cancer. Reportedly, pot attacks prostate cancer cell types that do not respond to the usual hormone treatments. A recent study by a team of Spanish researchers discovered THC kills various brain cancer cells by a process known as autophagy. Michigan's new law regarding marijuana use went into effect in April. Patients, with doctor's prescriptions, get a state-issued ID Card (a lot like California's) which allows them to grow and use marijuana to treat pain and other symptoms of cancer and multiple sclerosis. In October 2003, the University of California, San Francisco, released the results of a study that said pot was effective when used in combination with opiate pain medications. Dr. Donald Abrams, MD, UCSF professor of Clinical Medicine and chief of the Hematology-Oncology Division at SF General Hospital Medical Center, told the press, “Marijuana uses a different mechanism than opiates and could augment the pain relief of opiate analgesics.” The Marijuana Policy Project recently reported on a study that suggests moderate amounts of marijuana use reduces risk of head and neck squamous cell carcinoma (HNSCC). This study suggests cannabinoids have potential anti-tumor properties. A study released in July, “White matter in adolescents with history of marijuana use and binge drinking,” says marijuana use actually protects brain cells. The study involved adolescents with alcohol use disorders. One group had just alcohol-drinking teens. The other group drank alcohol and used marijuana. The report said that binge drinkers who used marijuana retained more white matter than the other group. In other words, alcohol destroyed more brain cells when a person didn't use marijuana. How many times have you heard someone say, “Pot destroys your brain cells”? If that's true, what about this study? Why do doctors use marijuana to fight brain cancer if it destroys brain cells? Remember the Spanish study? In April of 2007, Harvard University researchers released the results of a study that concluded THC cuts tumor growth in common lung cancers and reduces the ability of the cancer to spread. A study conducted by UCLA's medical school in June 2005 concluded smoking marijuana did not cause lung cancer. That impressive piece of news, along with the Harvard study, seems to have been ignored by most mass media outlets. Fred Gardner, editor of the medical marijuana research journal, O'Shaughnessy's, recently wrote an article, “Smoking Marijuana Does Not Cause Cancer,” about this groundbreaking UCLA study that barely made headlines. Gardner reported that an investigative team was contracted with the National Institute on Drug Abuse (NIDA) in 2002 “to conduct a large, population-based, case-controlled study that would prove definitively that heavy, long-term marijuana use increases the risk of lung and upper-airway cancers.” Guess what? This study backfired! It turned out that increased marijuana use did not result in higher rates of lung and pharyngeal cancer. The study also concluded that tobacco smokers who also puffed on pot were at a slightly lower risk of getting lung cancer than those who didn't! Perhaps the icing on the cake is the fact that UCLA Medical professor Donald Tashkin led the investigation. Tashkin has led government studies on marijuana since the 1970s and is well known for his belief that heavy marijuana use causes lung and upper-airway cancers. To his credit as a professional, he ended up disproving his own original hypothesis. Despite the government's efforts to keep it illegal, it's apparent that marijuana does offer help in the battle to treat cancer. The facts about marijuana's medical potentials are finally causing cracks in the government's wall of lies built up over the years. As It Stands, it's time to bring down that wall. Dave Stancliff is a columnist for The Times-Standard. He is a former newspaper editor and publisher. Source: Times-Standard (Eureka, CA) CannabisNews Medical Marijuana Archives Home Comment Email Register Recent Comments Help
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| Comment #21 posted by Storm Crow on October 19, 2009 at 13:30:11 PT |
| Why not send these to the Ass. D.A.! Cannabis chemicals may help fight prostate cancer http://www.reuters.com/article/healthNews/idUSTRE57I02Z20090819 Inhibition of human tumour prostate PC-3 cell growth by cannabinoids R(+)-Methanandamide and JWH-015: Involvement of CB2 - Abstract http://www.urotoday.com/index.php?option=com_content&task=view_ua&id=2224464 Chemicals found in cannabis may help fight prostate cancer http://www.heraldscotland.com/news/health/chemicals-found-in-cannabis-may-help-fight-prostate-cancer-1.823429# Suppression of Nerve Growth Factor Trk Receptors and Prolactin Receptors by Endocannabinoids Leads to Inhibition of Human Breast and Prostate Cancer Cell Proliferation http://endo.endojournals.org/cgi/content/abstract/141/1/118 Cannabinoid Receptor as a Novel Target for the Treatment of Prostate Cancer http://cancerres.aacrjournals.org/cgi/reprint/65/5/1635.pdf [ Post Comment ] |
| Comment #20 posted by MikeC on October 19, 2009 at 09:45:31 PT |
| I agree with your position. Remove marijuana smokers from the prisons and replace them with the real criminals. [ Post Comment ] |
| Comment #19 posted by Hope on October 19, 2009 at 09:07:30 PT |
| Criminal charges? Why not? Is there such a thing as a class action criminal charge? A situation where a group of citizens collectively bring criminal charges against someone, or some thing, or some organization or group? [ Post Comment ] |
| Comment #18 posted by mydnytmover on October 19, 2009 at 08:54:07 PT |
| I want freedom to but I would also like to see the drug war criminals in jail for all the lies and suffering they caused [ Post Comment ] |
| Comment #17 posted by Hope on October 19, 2009 at 06:07:12 PT |
| about my associations with other reformers, and especially on this website, is that we often are quite pleasantly surprised to see someone post exactly what we were thinking, too. There is such good encouragement in that. To know that someone else thinks like you and agrees with you and often is able to relate their feelings, and yours, so well that it's like a huge release of bottled up tension. It's a relief that it was finally said. It was articulated and that in it self is a huge relief. A burden lightened. Of course we don't agree with everyone all the time about everything. That would be weird. But we agree about a lot and that seems good. It speaks of peace and love. It speaks of self control. [ Post Comment ] |
| Comment #16 posted by MikeC on October 19, 2009 at 05:51:41 PT |
| Correct..no cash. All I want is freedom. [ Post Comment ] |
| Comment #15 posted by Hope on October 19, 2009 at 04:56:48 PT |
| Can you find out and let us know if there is any merit to MikeC's suggestion? [ Post Comment ] |
| Comment #14 posted by Hope on October 19, 2009 at 04:54:56 PT |
| A class action lawsuit, not asking for money, but for repeal of unjust laws, sounds like something that could shake this situation out considerably. Some lawyers, or lay people with knowledge of the law, or some body with the money and the will to stir this thing, need to seriously check out the possibilities of such a grievance being filed in the courts. Please. I know Norml, for sure, has a proliferation of lawyers and law students amongst them. Do it! Paul Armentano? Can you check this out and let us know something? Is there any merit to this approach? [ Post Comment ] |
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Comment #13 posted by EAH on October 18, 2009 at 22:44:37 PT:
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| The assistant District Attorney that prosecuted the forfeiture case against me had to delay the case for prostate cancer surgery. [ Post Comment ] |
| Comment #12 posted by MikeC on October 18, 2009 at 20:38:54 PT |
| Thank you for the follow-up and support. [ Post Comment ] |
| Comment #11 posted by Hope on October 18, 2009 at 19:31:20 PT |
| Surely we still have some lawyers, or law students, or someone among us, who knows such things that could tell us if that were possible. Yes, our fellow commenter and friend, Mai Bong City, Robin Prosser, and so many others like her, are on that list of people that would likely still be alive, even thriving, if it weren't for prohibition. Birds that eat cannabis can find food when suddenly their food sources aren't in the same places they are accustomed to finding them. Birds that didn't get cannabis didn't know what to do. Tortured cannabis consuming mice struggled longer, and with more vigor and energy, to be free of their torturing and abusive captors than did those tortured mice that did not consume cannabis. It's natural form is some of the most beneficial and non lethal stuff on the face of the earth. Food, fibers and fabrics for clothing and manufacturing, shelter, bricks, blocks, papers, plastics, oils, cosmetics, soaps, medicines, paints, and fuels are all available from the relatively fast growing, pollution cleaning, renewable, and replenishable, plant. It can heal some cancers. The government knows all this and they still prohibit the people, through threat of punitive law and law enforcement, from growing, possessing, studying, and using the plant. Why? In God's name... in the name of all that's true and sacred... in the name of common decency and humanity...why? [ Post Comment ] |
| Comment #10 posted by Hope on October 18, 2009 at 15:49:17 PT |
| the "Wild eyed" author was mistaking anger for wild. [ Post Comment ] |
| Comment #9 posted by FoM on October 18, 2009 at 11:54:27 PT |
| I wanted to add Robin to your list too. This is a moral issue to me and always will be. [ Post Comment ] |
| Comment #8 posted by Hope on October 18, 2009 at 11:50:49 PT |
| are a people that decided to care. That's what made the difference in any of the egregious portions of our history as humans and how they got reformed. People that cared. People that cared about Esequial Hernandaz. The Bowers family. Alberto Sepulveda. Peter McWilliams. So many more. All them and all the many more names prohibition, and not drugs, added to that bloody list. A terrible injustice has been done a great many people... a nation, nations even.... in the name of this "War on Drugs". [ Post Comment ] |
| Comment #7 posted by Hope on October 18, 2009 at 11:27:28 PT |
| First it was said... "It will keep you from puking your guts out during the harshest of chemo-therapies and it will increase your appetite considerably, possibly enabling you to eat." We said, "It can be life saving." Then we said, "It helps with seizures and spasms of all sorts." The we said, "It helps with serious muscular diseases and malfunctions of all sorts." "It can help with Tourette's Syndrome." "It helps some people with migraines and other headaches." "It helps some people deal with post traumatic stress issues." "It helps with pain." "It's an anti-inflammatory." "It reduces swelling after traumas of all sorts." "It helps asthma." "It helps with Premenstrual Syndrome". "It helps with Alzheimer's." "It's looking as though cannabinoids, that means cannabis, and some of the stuff it's made of, could be profoundly helpful in the prevention and treatment of osteoporosis." "It can prevent and heals some brain damage." We said, "Storm Crow's List". Then we said, "It can sometimes prevent and even cure cancer." We say, "The government knew." Of those hideous "Over four hundred compounds" from all those varied strains and strengths that prohibitionists used to like to get a freak fest going on about... which ones, or which combinations of what, are doing which, and what, of these wonderful things? Oh... but don't even talk about it.... or you might appear to be "Wild Eyed". Peter Williams' situation made me feel wild eyed sometimes. That's from grief and anger at the stupidity. Herbdoc's situation often made me feel wild eyed sometimes for the same reasons. Federal prison terms... long ones... for horticultural endeavors? Yes, they made me feel more than a little grieved, disturbed, unhappy, angry, infuriated, and dismayed... and maybe a bit wild eyed, from time to time. So sad to be so cool and upright in your own mind, or what you have left of it or control of, you can't even believe the truth and be amazed. [ Post Comment ] |
| Comment #6 posted by MikeC on October 18, 2009 at 11:04:43 PT |
| I don't know why we the people of the USA cannot bring a class action lawsuit against our federal government that would suspend all laws criminalizing marijuana? It has been proven time and time again that marijuana is a healing substance. We reserve the right to protect our health in whichever manner we personally choose. This is absolutely ridiculous. [ Post Comment ] |
| Comment #5 posted by Hope on October 18, 2009 at 10:40:33 PT |
| Now I realize when that guy likely first thought reformers were getting "wild eyed". When they spoke of this. [ Post Comment ] |
| Comment #4 posted by Hope on October 18, 2009 at 09:53:50 PT |
| The Mountain is washing in to the sea. [ Post Comment ] |
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Comment #3 posted by tintala on October 18, 2009 at 09:22:31 PT:
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| Thye were hoping for the proof, the big red flag that pot caused cancer, now, it even prevents it, all types, THE FEDS did not want to hear that. The DEA isnt gona give a crap about research, proof, and studies from scientist and docs, they are still gona keep bustig doors down until someone ( PREZ?) says enough is enough! I'm still waiting for proof of their claims that it's as harmful as c** and h*** and all other narcotics... what a blatant disregard for our intelligence.!!!! coz 100yrs of prohibtions says so.? [ Post Comment ] |
| Comment #2 posted by charmed quark on October 18, 2009 at 07:59:08 PT |
| Bet these were not the results they were expecting when they funded the study! [ Post Comment ] |
| Comment #1 posted by FoM on October 18, 2009 at 07:25:59 PT |
| Medical Marijuana Legislation Growing Throughout Country *** By Melody Brumble October 18, 2009
As more states debate medical marijuana policies, research at LSU Health Sciences Center-New Orleans offers new insights into how marijuana may affect people who suffer with HIV and AIDS. The study looks at how long-term use of THC, the primary active chemical in marijuana, affects the progression of an animal disease similar to HIV in the immune system as well as appetite and behavior in animals affected with the disease. The animals receive THC injections twice a day for up to a year. "Early findings suggest that, as far as the immune system is concerned, (THC) does not accelerate disease progression," said Dr. Patricia Molina, a professor and head of the physiology department at LSUHSC-New Orleans. Researchers will publish more complete results in the next few months. They plan to begin studying the same issues in humans if they can repeat their findings in animals and get more money for clinical research in humans. The National Institute on Drug Abuse, part of the U.S. government's National Institutes of Health, funded the LSUHSC-New Orleans. Similar research is going on in China, Molina said. Snipped: Complete Article: http://www.shreveporttimes.com/article/20091018/NEWS01/910180307 [ Post Comment ] |
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