Medical Cannabis in India: Holi Bhang

Holi, the yearly festival celebrating the return of color to the world, will start on Sunday Feb 28, 2010 and continue for 2 days until Monday March 1st. Holi is celebrated on the Phalgun Purnima (or Pooranmashi, Full Moon) according to the Hindu Calendar. Holi is a festival of radiance (teja) in the universe. The celebrations officially usher in spring, the celebrated season of love. It’s also the only holiday where use of ganga is pretty much widespread in the form of “bhang”,which is ganga mixed with herbs and spices in a milky beverage form. The use of bhang is regulated by the government, and only authorized “dealers” can sell it. The drink is traditionally said to come from Shiva. *

For millennia, copious amounts of the cannabis beverage have been consumed at the Hindu Holi Celebration, also called the Festival of Colours, which is a popular Hindu spring festival observed in India, Nepal, Srilanka, and other countries with large Hindu diaspora populations. In these celebrations thousands of participants drink bhanga and playfully throw colored paint on each other in a celebration of fertility, life and joy.

Chris Bennett via Cannabis Culture

Holi – the festival of colors – is undoubtedly the most fun-filled and boisterous of Hindu festival. It’s an occasion that brings in unadulterated joy and mirth, fun and play, music and dance, and, of course, lots of bright colors!

Medical Marijuana Month on daytime TV

February is medical marijuana month. Not sure if mainstream media was aware, but the topic popped up left and right last week. Here are some clips from “The Doctors”, “Tyra”, and “Shatner Raw” – an interview with Whoopie Goldberg.

VA docs forbidden to recommend medical marijuana

(Source: New Mexico Independent)  The largest group of patients enrolled in New Mexico’s medical marijuana program are those who suffer from post traumatic stress disorder, or PTSD, according to the most recent New Mexico Department of Health data. But Albuquerque’s Veteran’s Administration hospital–which many veterans rely on as their only source of health care–doesn’t allow its physicians to recommend the use of marijuana to patients.

Of 1,249 patients enrolled in the state medical marijuana program as of mid February, 291 have a diagnosis of PTSD. The next two largest groups are cancer patients, at 198, and HIV/AIDS patients, at 130.

PTSD is an anxiety disorder, sometimes severe, that is experienced by people who’ve endured dangerous situations, such as military combat. A Rand Corporation study in 2008 concluded that 20 percent of returning veterans from Iraq and Afghanistan suffer from PTSD or major depression.

At the same time, fewer than 10 percent of veterans with PTSD complete treatment programs for the disorder. Suicide among veterans has skyrocketed, and more vets have committed suicide since 2001 than have died on the battlefield in Iraq or Afghanistan.

Drug Enforcement Agency advises VA on policy

The VA policy that prohibits its doctors from recommending medical marijuana derives from the advice of the federal Drug Enforcement Agency, according to a policy statement given to The Independent by Sonja Brown, Chief of the Voluntary Service & Public Affairs Operations of the New Mexico VA Health Care System. This advice reflects the continued federal classification of marijuana as an illegal drug, despite the fact that  14 states now allow its use for medicinal purposes.

Over 2,500 Subjects Since 1995 Have Used Marijuana-Based Medicines In Controlled Clinical Trials

[Via NORML - editor's note: This post is excerpted from this week's forthcoming NORML weekly media advisory. To have NORML's media advisories delivered straight to your in-box, sign up for NORML's free e-zine here.]

Researchers worldwide have performed 37 separate clinical trials assessing the therapeutic safety and efficacy of inhaled cannabis and marijuana-based medicines since 2005, according to a review published online last week in the journal Cannabinoids: The Journal of the International Association for Cannabinoid Medicines (IACM).

Older Patients Turn to Marijuana for Relief (video)

More and more older people are turning to marijuana for medicinal purposes and urging legislators to legalize pot use for patients.  Read more from Alternet.

Hope You Enjoyed CMCR Report, Because That’s All, Folks

(Source)  It’s not news that marijuana may have healing qualities: after all, medicinal cannabis has been (sort of) the law of the land since 1996, when California voters passed Proposition 215 . Still, it was a very big deal when the Center for Medicinal Cannabis Research released the results last Wednesday of its 10-year, $9 million study on pot’s medical efficacy.

The good news? The tests were the first clinical trials conducted on marijuana in almost 20 years. The bad news? They might be the last clinical trials conducted for the near future – and who knows? – maybe another 20 years.

Photo via How Stuff Works

The issue isn’t whether or not pot can alleviate pain, stimulate appetite, act as a sleep aid or perform a host of other functions for ailing patients. That much advocates have been saying for years. CMCR director Dr. Igor Grant and his team added their voices to the chorus, saying that marijuana could indeed be an effective treatment for pain-related ailments. The problem is that finding more dollars for more research, especially at the federal level, is going to be tough.

Feds: There’s no medical marijuana except OUR medical marijuana

(Source: The Colorado Independent)  Brian Vicente, executive director of Sensible Colorado, a medical marijuana advocacy group, has said the federal charges filed against Highlands Ranch resident pot grower Chris Bartkowicz takes the whole medical marijuana defense off the table. Bartkowicz is screwed, says Vincente, because the federal government doesn’t recognize any medicinal value to pot, regardless of what state laws or doctors say. Yet the federal Department of Health and Human Services owns the patent for cannabinoids– an antioxidant nerve protector contained in good old fashioned dope.

“In federal court, you can’t say the words ‘medical marijuana,’ so his defense is gutted,” Vicente told Westword. “The U.S. Attorney is absolutely aware of that… That’s why this is so disturbing… They’re trying to put him in jail for forty years for a medical marijuana grow. They’re doing it in violation of what the voters of this state want and in violation of what President Obama has said he wants.”

White House not talking about marijuana research

(Source)  California researchers while presenting an update of their findings to the California Legislature on Wednesday said that marijuana can help in reducing specific pain-related medical conditions.

Five small studies and two more that are underway found that modest amount of marijuana smoking can help alleviate pain and muscle spasms that takes place due to multiple sclerosis. It also synchronized with earlier belief that physical discomfort is reduced by pot. This has been a prime argument of the medical marijuana movement.

California state that was funding study on marijuana no more has the money to fund for further research by the Center for Medical Cannabis Research at UC San Diego. The White House is not showing serious concern regarding marijuana’s medicinal properties and no one is talking about a national study to expand on the UC work.

Igor Grant, MD, executive vice-chairman of the department of psychiatry at the University of California San Diego School of Medicine and director of the Center for Medicinal Cannabis Research at the University of California, said, ”I think the evidence is getting better and better that marijuana, or the constituents of cannabis, are useful at least in the adjunctive treatment of neuropathy.”

Experts who after reviewing the report stated that facts were flawed and further research was needed as they worry about marijuana being used for medical use.

Cannabis Policy: Moving Beyond Stalemate

Cannabis Policy: Moving Beyond Stalemate, analyzes cannabis policies around the world and lays out the advantages of a fully regulated legal market and how a country can overcome the international conventions in order to have policies that better suites its individual needs. Below is an excerpt from the book.

(Article source: Huffington Post / Image from NORML)

Cannabis is by far the most widely used illegal drug and therefore the mainstay of the ‘War on Drugs.’ It is used by an estimated 4% of the global adult population, that is, 166 million people out of an estimated population of 200 million illegal drug users’. It therefore constitutes roughly 80% of the ‘illegal drug market.’ However, cannabis has only ever held a relatively marginal position in international drug policy discussions. In response to its peripheral role in the global debate, I decided to convene a team of the world’s leading drug policy analysts to prepare an overview of the latest scientific evidence surrounding cannabis and the policies controlling its use. The report would both bring cannabis to the attention of policy-makers and also provide them with the relevant facts to better inform their future decisions, particularly in the context of the United Nations Strategic Drug Policy Review of 2009, and thereafter.

The historical context of the United Nations’ policy is critical here. In 1998, the international community agreed a 10-year program of activity for the control of illegal drug use and markets. These agreements were made at a United Nations General Assembly Special Session (UNGASS) held in New York in June of that year, and a commitment was made to reassess the situation at the end of the 10-year period. The nature of this program was epitomized by the slogan ‘A drug free world — we can do it!’ However, the reality is that since 1998 drugs have in general become cheaper and more readily available than ever before. We hope that this volume will help lead the way towards a more rational, effective and just approach to the control of cannabis.

Marijuana Smoking on Rise for Seniors

*Also check out Alternet: Why Growing Numbers of Baby Boomers and the Elderly Are Smoking Pot

(AP Photo/Chuck Burton)

(AP Photo/Chuck Burton)

By Gina Gomez – THAINDIAN NEWS

A recent survey shows that there is an increase in the number of senior citizens using marijuana. Though one of the most popular of illicit drugs in the country, people who were in their teens during 1960s and 1970s were more exposed to it. According to latest reports, people who are 50 or older, admitted that they consumed marijuana when they were young. In the last year there was a rise of 1.9 percent to 2.9 percent in the number of marijuana smokers, in the senior age group, as compared to 2002 to 2008. The rise was mostly traced in people aged 55-59 years. Their use of marijuana nearly tripled from 1.6 percent to 5.1 percent in a few years.

An increase in marijuana use is expected in the years to follow. Marijuana was not a taboo for people who were in their late teens during 1945 and 1964. Some of them have continued to consume marijuana from their youth till now. On the other hand, some senior citizens took to the addiction after their retirement.

Some senior people who are suffering from some kind of illness said that none of the drugs could help them overcome it except marijuana. Perry Parks, a 67-year-old Army pilot said he suffered severe pain from arthritis and degenerative disc disease. He tried all kinds of medicines, but nothing helped. 2 years back, he started using marijuana which he had tried during his college days. He said, it really worked and added, “I am essentially pain free.” Some of the people who are more than 50 years prefer marijuana to sleeping pills. They admit that despite taking sleeping pills, they could not sleep. However, marijuana worked wonders.

Source – Rightpundits.com:

Instead of suggesting ice cream to help Grandma deal with this tough economy, like in the olden days, it appears we just need to get Grandma some pot. Hmm. Actually, after Grandma steps outside to smoke herself a J, (ala Paul Simon), then she’ll really want that bowl of ice cream. Hey, two birds with one stone. No pun intended.