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Money, Medicine & Marijuana

  • Thread starter Thread starter Litopian
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Brass tacks, I was really keen to do this show and to have on such a big gun. I think it's an important subject. And, judging by the cackling of the wife, it's a good one. However, well: here's an excerpt from e-mail I just sent to Agent Pete:

<Had a heated conversation with the wife post-show in which three things were revealed to me as gospel:
1. The decriminalization of marijuana must needs to be addressed on an economical level, an incarceration level and, most importantly, a medicinal level-- how can we withhold plant-based medicine from the seriously ill in the name of a failed drug war backed by etc. etc?
2. The UK govenment's stance of ambivalence, "not really all that bovvered about the issue, mate" does, in fact, reflect the will of the people, even the stoners. Meaning that, somewhat bafflingly:
3. No one really gives a shit but me-- and a bunch of hippies, shrinks and policy wonks. It's just a non-issue. Fucking mental, you people.>

(And by "you people" I mean that in the worst possible way)

Prove me wrong, fellow Litopians. Please.
 
I think it has a lot of potential as a medicinal plant that needs to be properly and un-biased-ly explored. I don't smoke myself, normal or 'alternative' tobacco, but I don't discriminate against those that do.
 
I am ambivalent. I have seen a lot of marijuana use gone wrong, close to, entered into recreationally where it has triggered psychosis; I can think of 3 people off the top of my head who went nuts on it, 2 of whom started using weed in their teens, bought at the school gates. I would hate youngsters to get a criminal record when they can get the stuff so easily; that is not what one can call fair or proportionate. I would not touch it, because though I am lucky never to have experienced depression, my father had bipolar disorder from the age of 17, narrowly escaped lobotomy in the late 1940's and it shadowed his life, though he lived the last 30 years of his life without hospitalisation, and died entirely his own man, and I believe, completely 'himself' at the very end, which came when he was alone. So, there are families and people who perhaps ought not to take it because of some predisposition that makes the risks different for them.

But also, I am so sick of the medical establishment, peeps with chronic problems are pretty much at the bottom of the heap; left to rot, actually, unless they are extremely pro-active on their own behalf. Acute OR else what is fashionable in medicine (and it does have fashions) and is lauded as 'ground-breaking' gets top priority and ticks the boxes for early positive outcomes. thereby justifying resources. I have read that marijuana reduces suffering for some people with MS and other chronic degenerative conditions. It would seem barbarous not to have medical marijuana there, available for prescription when the currently endorsed alternatives for some of these very cruel and incurable conditions are so hit and miss, not to say, poor. These people should not have to break the law to get what palliates.
 
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Yes, Carol, Katie-- thank you!
(only smoked marijuana once-- between Oct 1988 and September 1999. Haven't touched in 12 years. Oversaw professional hydroponic grow operation for one year in exchange for a cabin in the woods where I could write my first novel. The mandatory maximum sentence I would have received if caught? Ten years federal, no questions asked. Now that same plant is de facto legal in California but there are still people in prison for my same offense. And yes, I have another axe to grind: my grandmother died of wasting from chemotherapy for ovarian cancer)

If you listen to the show-- and please do listen to the show, listen to all the shows, love the shows, tweet the shows, tell your friends :D-- Dr. Winstock takes less than a second to say based on the research he'd prescribe high CBD cannabis for epilepsy if he could. Bang. I've talked to other doctors who would do the same for chemo induced nausea, arthritis, glaucoma-- and at least give it a go for chronic pain.

This boils down to 3 things:

1. Hey government: there is money on the table. What's wrong with you people-- usually your nose is in the trough. Take that money! Set some rules and regs then build some schools like in Colorado. Are you so deep in bed with the pharmaceutical companies, prisons, police unions, Big Booze... oh, right. *sigh*

2. People are being jailed and/or saddled with criminal records over a plant that is demonstrably, definitively & massively less harmful than alcohol and nicotine. Those DRUGS kills hundreds of thousands every year! There is no lethal dose for cannabis! Stop throwing matchsticks at the sun! Why is this hard?

3. Medicine and medical research-- and again, there's money to be made here.

Only, see, we're all guilty here: there IS a social stigma for being a decriminalization proponent. The fact we all feel the need to preamble whether or not we've "used" before we even enter this discussion is part of the problem. Because it doesn't matter. This is beyond the personal. This is beyond the socially awkward. This is about prison, social benefits and pain.

"It's just a bit o spliff tho, innit bruv?"
 
If I had tried it, I'd feel OK saying so without fear of being hauled off to jail; I am saying so to set a context for comment. As a student I was so green that being offered a spliff at a party I didn't know what it was and said, thanks, I don't smoke, and took another sip of cider (!)If I tried it and could walk next day I'd want more, for sure, and a young person once offered to get me some, and I did not want him getting into trouble and also I knew the local seller was not really an Ok person to know. My brother confiscated some once (he's in the police) and I said, oy, send it up here for me to try, Sorry, sis...wish I could, but it's all got to get catalogued and accounted for.

'Bad' can be 'good'. My father smoked a pipe and it drove my mother round the bend...hated the smell. Threw it away and he got another. But then what did I read recently? Nicotinoids can calm bipolar disorder. Clearly, the pipe helped him.

Palm oil, diabetes 2, obesity epidemic, anyone? Who legalised the cream cakes?
 
It's when they legalised cheese that I got really upset.
So, Octi
Octopus Messiah said:
And yes, I have another axe to grind: my grandmother died of wasting from chemotherapy for ovarian cancer)

If you listen to the show-- and please do listen to the show, listen to all the shows, love the shows, tweet the shows, tell your friends :D-- Dr. Winstock takes less than a second to say based on the research he'd prescribe high CBD cannabis for epilepsy if he could. Bang. I've talked to other doctors who would do the same for chemo induced nausea, arthritis, glaucoma-- and at least give it a go for chronic pain.

This boils down to 3 things:

1. Hey government: there is money on the table. What's wrong with you people-- usually your nose is in the trough. Take that money! Set some rules and regs then build some schools like in Colorado. Are you so deep in bed with the pharmaceutical companies, prisons, police unions, Big Booze... oh, right. *sigh*

2. People are being jailed and/or saddled with criminal records over a plant that is demonstrably, definitively & massively less harmful than alcohol and nicotine. Those DRUGS kills hundreds of thousands every year! There is no lethal dose for cannabis! Stop throwing matchsticks at the sun! Why is this hard?

3. Medicine and medical research-- and again, there's money to be made here.

Only, see, we're all guilty here: there IS a social stigma for being a decriminalization proponent. The fact we all feel the need to preamble whether or not we've "used" before we even enter this discussion is part of the problem. Because it doesn't matter. This is beyond the personal. This is beyond the socially awkward. This is about prison, social benefits and pain.

"It's just a bit o spliff tho, innit bruv?"
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I'm very sorry; ovarian cancer is a seriously terrible disease, but it has very poor survival figues, causes wasting as does chemo; she wouldn't have been given it if they hadn't felt it would help. Doctors as a rule want to help suffering not create it. Hippocratic oath and all that.
Research costs- lots. It's a risk to see if a saleable drug pops out the other end; hence they choose their potential products on a balance of evidence/probability
2. That's like saying if society ignored murders and put away burglars that we should stop putting away burglars; we need to address both, not stop addressing one problem because a second/third one has not been fully addressed.
Medical research will embrace anything that helps- if there is enough evidence/ risk/benefit ratio is good/finances add up. We are not resistant to something because it's got a social stigma. Hence we use Nabilone medically; a synthetic cannabinoid.
 
Ah, the Good Doctor! Good to see you again.

As I pointed out in the opening segment, this is a hard topic to address due to confirmation bias, mine own included. You can find arguments on either side because very little dispassionate research is PERMITTED by governments, and much of it is influenced by special interest groups-- though Canada under Trudeau is set to repeal these crazy bans (yay!) and changes are underway in the US.

Point by point: wasting does not increase survival rate or quality of life for cancer or any other patient. As I understand current research, synthetic cannabinoids are not nearly as effective as high-potency marijuana for increasing appetite or decreasing pain. Problem is, there are too many variables-- too many psycho and non-psychoactive compounds-- in all strains of marijuana, so it becomes a guessing game subject to snake (Butane Hash) oil salesmen. The mechanism for why pot makes you hungry has, however, been known for quite some time. This is the the problem they're having in Colorado, Oregon & California where it's been medically available for years. How to figure out dosage is something that needs expensive (agreed) research-- like the kind reserved for all pharmaceuticals that come to market. And yet the governments of America and the UK refuse to allow large scale studies, especially on strains being developed with more CBD and less THC-- like the kind Dr. Winstock would prescribe for epilepsy if he could. It's not that medical research won't embrace it: it's that they can't. The money is there and so is the potential profit but still...

My problem with the burglary/murder argument is that the legitimate dangers of marijuana such as driving impairment or the adolescent brain development-- are but a single tree in the deep, dark forest of lethal drugs available, and taxed, on every street corner. It's the hypocrisy that angers me the most, Ali: If we really are concerned for the children and manic-depressives, and can't trust good parenting/government regulation like we do for lethal drugs like alcohol and tobacco, then let's take them off the shelves as well instead of criminalizing a drug with a zero LD50. A *flower* that, once legalized, lowered the murder rate in Colorado by 24%.

Medicine aside: What's the human cost of a bigger black market? Prohibition anyone?
 
Quick google on Nabilone (emphasis on common)
Common side effects may include:
  • headache, dizziness, drowsiness;
  • feeling "high";
  • weakness, lack of coordination;
  • depressed mood;
  • dry mouth; or.
  • trouble concentrating.
Tomato/to-mah-to? Trouble is, there's little profit off something that works just as well, or better, that anyone can grow in their back garden. Like, uh, tomatoes. Unless you're one of the main players in the anti-legalization lobby, like the prison unions, prison guard association, police unions, alcohol lobby, Pharmaceutical companies like the manufacturer of Nabilone (Valeant) and another group I can't remember because I lost my short term memory :oops:...
 
Oh, Ian, you were always so good at the pouring forth of passionate- if sometimes rambling- arguments. My role was the short succinct voice of reason; so you've pashed, I've shorted; I'll now mosey off into middle distance. Share a thread with me again sometime.
 
AliG said:
Oh, Ian, you were always so good at the pouring forth of passionate- if sometimes rambling- arguments. My role was the short succinct voice of reason; so you've pashed, I've shorted; I'll now mosey off into middle distance. Share a thread with me again sometime.
Click to expand...
My bad. I *am* passionate and probably too-informed for my own good on this issue-- though this time I believe reason is on my side. Please excuse the ramble. But also do enjoy the show! Dude's an addiction specialist M.D. (and fifty other letters) who advises government on drug policy and runs the largest independent drug survey around. Better voice on the subject than mine...
Your thread or mine?
 
You seem well informed on just about every issue. Coming back to you soon for household tips on the removal of cats from Christmas trees.
Will pick up LAD asap; will be fun to tune in.
Dunno. We could meet somewhere neutral- like the forum. Valete!
 
Now, don't hit me with a cushion :) I agree on many points, and think this is a very important and timely topic for discussion by people who know a lot more about it than I do. Medical use aside, right at the moment, I am rather growing to dislike the idea of marijuana whether legal or not, while reasoning this likely isn't the fault of the marijuana, itself. I am witnessing misery in loved ones, and while it is not the root cause, and perhaps something in the zeitgeist is; it is adding to it. A nephew in Aus has been kicked off a valuable apprenticeship in cabinet making for being stoned at work. 20. Another nephew, 21, is due up before the magistrates in the UK for not just using, but possibly growing and selling. He has been diagnosed with schizophrenia and psychosis, perhaps not due to the marijuana, perhaps not helped by it. Hard to know. He has been not quite right for many years, his devoted, worldly wise and very resourceful parents are in agony , busting their guts and brains trying to help him. But also, he's been using weed for years, and no doubt, the picture is complicated by other substances coming into the mix. On the other hand I remember friends of ancient yesteryear who smoked or ate it. Resin (?) and were absolutely fine so far as I could see, just mellow with it, same as a nice glass of wine. One worked in advertising and design, the other was an electrical engineer. Perhaps the general profile of 'the user' has changed in a way that makes a difference to its safe and happy use. Someone in the drug squad told me, what is being sold now is not the same as the little plant of earlier decades, that it is typically much stronger.
 
There is a trend among dealers to spritz the plants with sugar water and other such mixtures to give more weight to the buds. And the use of chemical fertilizers not being properly rinsed out of the plant prior to cropping, these can both give adverse effects to the smoker and create more problems than they aid. I think any drug, synthetic or natural, can highlight existing mental ailments such as paranoia and anxiety. I knew a guy who was seriously addicted to mj, he turned nasty without it. Like, obnoxious and argumentative. The guy is not the nicest to begin with, but say he can't have weed and he's an ar*ehole to the extreme. He spends around £200 a month though, at a conservative estimate.

Personally I think no drug can affect everyone the same way, side effects are usually generalised. I've also known people who have smoked for thirty plus years and have no withdrawal symptoms at all.
 
Interesting thread, and I wish I hadn't missed the show that kicked it off. I have smoked weed, but not in years, because I'm old, and I don't smoke anything any more. Put me in the legalization camp. Regulate it and tax it like alcohol; label it according to potency. Back in the day, you didn't always know if you were going to end up falling down stoned or feeling relaxed.

A postscript: I moved to San Francisco a little over a year ago. Among the move-in coupons that appeared in my mail was one for $20 off my first quarter ounce (The stuff has gotten expensive!) along with a free home visit from a doctor who would diagnose "my condition" and prescribe accordingly.
 
Patricia D said:
Interesting thread, and I wish I hadn't missed the show that kicked it off.
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You haven't missed the show at all! It's right here: https://litopia.com/money-medicine-marijuana/
Dr. Winstock also addresses the issue of different "stones" for different plant strains (as opposed to the unknown baggie you and I used to roll the dice on!)

Otherwise, couldn't have said it better-- or more succinctly-- myself. Used to, don't anymore. Legalize it and tax it like alcohol and tobacco (which are, to belabor the point, lethal). The social harm of a thriving, unregulated black market far outweigh the dangers of abuse. @Katie-Ellen Hazeldine: substitute the word "alcohol" for weed and we all have that friend/know that dude. Disallowing weed on personal/anecdotal grounds while still keep booze and cigarettes on the table is hypocrisy, full stop.

Again: this issue is beyond the anecdotal. This is about the big numbers. Money and lives wasted on incarceration. People in pain. Colorado has so-far not become the smoked-out, crime-ridden sloth world many predicted and it amazes me there's so much resistance to following its example from otherwise rational people.

Happy New Year!
 
Heh:) But you haven't missed it, Patricia. Click on the red link, the Litopian (Pentapus?) posting at the top of the thread
 
Octopus Messiah said:
You haven't missed the show at all! It's right here: https://litopia.com/money-medicine-marijuana/
Dr. Winstock also addresses the issue of different "stones" for different plant strains (as opposed to the unknown baggie you and I used to roll the dice on!)

Otherwise, couldn't have said it better-- or more succinctly-- myself. Used to, don't anymore. Legalize it and tax it like alcohol and tobacco (which are, to belabor the point, lethal). The social harm of a thriving, unregulated black market far outweigh the dangers of abuse. @Katie-Ellen Hazeldine: substitute the word "alcohol" for weed and we all have that friend/know that dude. Disallowing weed on personal/anecdotal grounds while still keep booze and cigarettes on the table is hypocrisy, full stop.

Again: this issue is beyond the anecdotal. This is about the big numbers. Money and lives wasted on incarceration. People in pain. Colorado has so-far not become the smoked-out, crime-ridden sloth world many predicted and it amazes me there's so much resistance to following its example from otherwise rational people.

Happy New Year!
Click to expand...


Yes, I made those same distinctions.
 
Katie-Ellen Hazeldine said:
Yes, I made those same distinctions.
Click to expand...
Sorry, yes, you did. What's wrong with me? Maybe I'm still high? From 2004?

And you're right, what's on the street is also stupid strong now. The THC content of the strongest strains used to be aroun 8% in the 70's. Now your average strain is around the 15% mark, and 20% for the strong stuff. Think of beer versus grain alcohol. But Butane Hash Oil-- wax or dabs-- is up around 80%. This has both a downside (no long term studies on use/abuse at this concentration) and upside (cancer patients can eat a tiny breathmint for the same effect which does no damage to the lungs). It was the upside that Dr. Winstock pointed out which surprised me.

Now, and for the last time, HAPPY NEW YEAR EVERYBODY! (wife says "Now put the laptop down and change out of your pajamas." Some kind of party going on or something.)
 
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