02/01/2015 12:07
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Even though commonly known as a likely trigger for schizophrenia, marihuana also contains an ingredient that looks to have antipsychotic outcomes. Tom Ireland goes to the UK’s only authorized mairhuana plantation and is introduced to the person accountable for breeding a plant that can be of great benefit to many
In a massive glasshouse a few hours from London, there’s a powerful, unmistakable smell in the air: it’s the one that seems to embrace numerous surly young adults and drifts around on the breeze at pop fests. Here, 30,000 cannabis plants sway slowly underneath massive fans and very bright lamps. Just the amazing consistency of the crops - as well as the folks walking round in lab apparel - notifys you the location isn’t some drug lord’s unlawful cannabis manufacturing plant.
This is the only study facility in the UK registered to cultivate mairhuana on a vast commercial level. Here, Dr David Potter has overseen the production of around 2m mairhuana plants, generally for medical analysis or the manufacturing of the cannabis-based multiple sclerosis substance Sativex. He is director of botany and cultivation for GW Pharmaceuticals, a business that is looking at just how marijuana could help cure numerous ailments including epilepsy to cancer.
Not long ago Potter and GW’s group have turned their focus on developing a cannabis-based cure for psychosis and related ailments such as schizophrenia. For a drug that is broadly seen as a trigger for severe psychotic health issues in young users, this at first sounds ludicrous. However, as Potter makes clear, the marijuana crop is much more than just a psychedelic weed.
“The most well-known compound in marijuana that gets folks high is THC [or tetrahydrocannabinol],” reveals Potter, who normally travels to give discussions in London carrying a suspicious-smelling bag of the crops. “But THC is among the dozens of potentially useful cannabinoids within the plant.”
Cannabinoids are substances that act upon the brain’s cannabinoid receptors, part of a system that regulates various physiological processes which includes pain sensation, mood, memory and appetite.
In large doses, THC could lead to short-term schizophrenia-like psychotic signs or symptoms such as paranoia, delusions, anxiety and hallucinations. Nevertheless marijuana also includes a cannabinoid generally known as CBD (or cannabidiol), which appears to have almost the precise reverse effect.
Pure CBD can have antipsychotic and anti-anxiety effects, and may lessen the psychotic signs or symptoms typically felt by people given higher doses of THC. Investigation by University College London furthermore implies that people who smoke cannabis rich in CBD are less likely to experience “schizophrenia-like symptoms” compared to those who smoke cannabis containing only THC.
Regrettably for the mental well being of several young cannabis users, the chemical profile of the substance has evolved tremendously within the last thirty years. Not only does modern-day cannabis consist of a lot more than twice as much THC as it did within the Sixties, it also now contains hardly any of the “neuroprotective” cannabinoid CBD.
Potter has evaluated numerous samples of street mairhuana on behalf of the Home Office and the law enforcement department, in parallel to his work cultivating the crop for medical study. With this “library” of cannabis samples and seeds stretching back ages, he has managed to keep track of precisely how mairhuana has changed.
The beginnings of contemporary mairhuana could be traced to California in the late 70's, when professional breeders started to find the strongest, THC-rich plants the very first time. “Until then, the majority of mairhuana came in the form of hashish resin, made of mixed populations of plants from regions of Asia, Africa, as well as the Caribbean, made up of varying amounts of both CBD and THC,” states Potter.
In the pursuit to make ever-stronger mairhuana, farmers may have by accident bred out a protective chemical substance
Simply because of the intricate genetics of the mairhuana plant, cultivators selectively breeding THC-rich crops were also selecting against the gene that produces CBD. To paraphrase, in the quest to make ever stronger mairhuana, illicit cultivators may have unintentionally bred out a chemical substance that safeguarded the mental well being of consumers during the past.
“When skunk was developed the folks doing it were clueless they were changing the proportions of CBD and THC - they just kept breeding the crops that offered the best high and threw the remainder away.”
By 1984, a variety of marijuana termed “skunk#1” came to Europe. Branded after its strong scent, it contained 15% THC rather than the 1-8% present in old types.
Marijuana smokers in the united kingdom never looked back and skunk is currently quite possibly the most prevalent kind of cannabis sold illegally here. By 2004-5, Potter could find little or no traces of CBD whatsoever in a batch of Five hundred seized marijuana samples presented to him for investigation by the Home Office.
The exact effect this change has had on the mental wellbeing of marijuana consumers is hard to say - the connection between cannabis and schizophrenia continues to be complex and questionable. Scientists have struggled to verify whether marijuana brings about psychosis, or whether individuals prone to psychosis are simply more likely to smoke weed. The best proof at present indicates that in people who are genetically vulnerable to schizophrenia, regular mairhuana use doubles their probability of encountering psychotic symptoms. However no long-term studies of people with schizophrenia have chemically examined the kind of mairhuana the subjects were smoking.
Potter has seen the extreme outcomes of both substance abuse and schizophrenia in his job as a justice of the peace for his local court. He recounts a recent case where a somewhat pleasant teenager, struggling with acute and abrupt psychotic health issues, had turned to alcohol consumption and become violent.
“He ended up smashing someone’s teeth out for no reason at all,” says Potter. The accused, now diagnosed and medicated, will still be found guilty in spite of his temporary madness. “In court it simply struck me just what a good chap he was.”
The demand for new antipsychotic substances is demanding. Around 0.5% of the population are believed to be affected by schizophrenia - as much as 20-30 million at any time around the world - and about a third of those usually do not respond to antipsychotics.
Existing medication does little to cure the other disabling signs of the ailment - chronic swelling, low mood, anxiety, and cognitive impairment - and often has stressing side-effects including weight gain, involuntary movements and drowsiness.
All antipsychotics act generally by modifying the brain’s production of dopamine, and the reality that CBD functions in a different way could possibly be ideal for that thirdly of people with schizophrenia who don’t react to present medicines. Studies suggest CBD, with its anti-inflammatory and anti-anxiety effect, may possibly also help cure schizophrenia’s wider signs, not just the psychosis.
Final results from double-blind, phase II clinical trials for CBD as a schizophrenia treatment will report next season. For now hopes rest on a small trial involving Thirty-nine individuals with schizophrenia, 19 of whom received the antipsychotic substance amisulpride, the rest CBD. At the end of the four-week trial, both groups showed significant improvement in their symptoms, however the CBD cohort revealed much less side-effects.
Potter and his group continue to be watchful, since it is not yet totally recognized how CBD really works - it's basic to state CBD just does the complete opposite of the psychosis-inducing THC. One concept is that CBD enhances the activity of other cannabinoids produced naturally by the human brain.
No matter what outcomes of GW’s clinical trials, study from around the world on CBD has kick-started a movement between numerous marijuana consumers to switch to CBD-rich varieties hoping of a safer, tranquil substance. Allegedly CBD-rich cannabis products are now on the market by “therapeutic” merchants from Amsterdam to San Francisco - and if more investigation finds CBD-rich marijuana in fact is significantly less risky than skunk, it could actually strengthen the case for the legalisation and regulation of marijuana products.
Potter is passionate about mairhuana, yet he isn't a politician. He does not want to enter the argument regarding legalisation, and doesn’t advocate any kind of smoking because of its dreadful wellness ramifications. All of the medicines GW develops are employed in standard routes for example throat sprays or liquids, and none get consumers high.
He now states that his crops have just as much CBD as there is THC in the most powerful skunk, after years of selective breeding in the other direction by illegitimate producers.
It has taken him more than a decade to get to a point where he is able to cultivate both CBD- and THC-rich marijuana of constant strength on a vast level. When he tried to find CBD-rich types with which to carry out health care investigation in the late 90s, 97% of commercially available seedlings created THC-dominant plants.
“Seeds for CBD-rich crops were very difficult to find,” he recounts. “It took me to all kinds of places, such as one quite strange shop in Amsterdam.
“We are now able to produce plants as high as 15% CBD, way more than you'd probably find normally. However it’s our productivity that is actually much higher than outlawed growers,” he says with pride.
The unique, secret glasshouse in which Potter works naturally involved considerable discussions around security before the authorities would grant a licence. Until now, states Potter, absolutely no attempts have been made on the bounty within.
50 % of the tens of thousands of plants growing here at any one time are CBD-rich, half THC-rich. The 2 varieties are collected; the cannabinoids extracted and combined in various proportions for different therapeutic effects.
It’s unlikely any burglars will be able to separate the 2 types anyway - half would be utterly worthless to recreational users. But due to the promise CBD has demonstrated in a range of therapies under study, Potter’s CBD-rich crop is possibly far more beneficial than the THC crop.
He says it's “a thrill” to work with a crop with so many cultural and spiritual links. He describes the uncommon, original skunk#1 crops from California, which now reside in GW’s plant library, as having “significant social history” in terms of how they altered cannabis and its persona for ever. Maybe his newest plant, abundant with CBD and low in THC, would be the next mairhuana crop of significant importance to society.
There’s one last question you must ask a person who has supervised the production of millions of marijuana plants and who has samples of some the strongest skunk ever seized in the UK in his office. Has he ever got “high off his own supply”, as they say?
“I never have, and it’s probably best to keep that genie in the bottle,” suggests Potter. “If I find I enjoy it and I’m surrounded by it all day it will be somewhat of a problem.”
Medical Marijuana: Current therapeutic use
Cannabinoids in the mairhuana plant are being explored for a variety of remedial uses. Medicinal marijuana components are presently given in a number of nations to relieve discomfort, treat muscle spasticity, and reduce nausea in the course of chemo.
CBD (cannabidiol) is being researched as a possible cure for epilepsy, diabetes, appetite-loss, a variety of inflammatory diseases for example arthritis, and psychosis and schizophrenia. The substance has additionally been discovered to be a powerful anti-oxidant and also appears to inhibit cancer cell rise in a number of rare cancers.
The reality that chemicals produced by mairhuana connect to crucial receptors within the body is solely a chance, it is assumed. Cannabinoids are thought to be merely a defensive system to safeguard the plant against predators and severe environmental conditions.
A combination of dozens of cannabinoids and bitter-tasting oils are made in specific structures named trichomes, tiny membrane-bound globules which are mainly clustered round the flowers of the plant.
When an invading pest breaks the delicate membrane of the globule, volatile oils escape off, just like in a solvent-based adhesive, and the pest is glued to the plant in seconds.
THC, therefore, much revered because of its psychedelic results, is nothing more than a component in nature’s Loctite, it appears. Just like a large number of other potentially useful ingredients.