Cannabis vs cancer: The Antineoplastic & Antitumoral Effects of THC & CBD
Science has shown Cannabis has efficacy against cancer along with many other diseases & illness. Anecdotal reports corroborate the science.
It’s been awhile since AN published something new on Subs. So thanks for your patience.
The discussion of Cannabis use, either recreationally or medicinally, tends to drive a good deal of polarisation. Many, many people are still utterly opposed to it’s use, any use. One hundred years of anti-drugs propaganda has had that effect. Many of us still see Cannabis use as extremely detrimental to both physical & mental health. Those against the use of Cannabis will often cite it’s harm to the mental health of teenage users, claim that it causes brain damage or finger the drug for causing lung &/or brain cancer. It’s a lot harder to find peer-reviewed science supporting these claims than it is to find people making them.
So what we’re doing here is, we’re going to briefly assess the evidence that Cannabis has use in cancer & a couple of other Cannabis related angles & issues.
The oldest official looking report AN can find of Cannabis as a useful medicine goes back to the 1940’s, when Cannabis oil’s beneficial use in children with seizures was first reported.
MARJUANA LEAF PLAYS EPILEPSY CURE ROLE
The use of Cannabis to help with childhood seizures, which can often be fatal, has been well known for many years. The famous story of a British mother who would travel regularly to Holland to collect Cannabis oil for her son, & eventually was stopped & had her medicine seized by British customs helped bring this topic out of the area of conspiracy theorising & into the public domain.
British Sugar in Norfolk grows vast amounts of Cannabis which is exported & sold to GW Pharma, who make herbal Cannabis into a medicinal oil which is then sold to the public at a truly exorbitant cost. Treating a child with seizures with Cannabis oil sourced officially can cost thousands per year, in the UK.
Let’s remember that Cannabis is a weed that grows easily pretty much anywhere!
British Sugars Paul Kenwood showing off his pride & joy.
British Sugar to cultivate cannabis plants in Norfolk for GW Pharmaceuticals
Kenwood was the subject of an interesting report about five years ago, as he is married to a British MP who was tasked at the time with British drugs law reform.
The Mirror - Tories blasted for links to medical cannabis industry despite UK ban on "life-saving" drugs
GW Pharma were also reported in 2017 to be working on oncological medicines based on Cannabinoids.
The Telegraph - GW pharmaceuticals to develop oncology portfolio after cannabis medication shows promising results
In 2015, National Geographic published a major article on the science behind Cannabis as a medicine, entitled Science seeks to unlock marijuana's secrets . The article has since been secreted behind a paywall so anyone with a Nat Geo log-in can see for themselves & everyone else will just have to trust AN… at least until we can scan the pages of the article to upload…
The Nat Geo piece spends a good deal of time discussing Manuel Guzman, a Spanish scientist & researcher who has spent 30 years+ investigating the use of Cannabis to treat cancer in humans. Although the Nat Geo article goes to some effort to downplay the use of Cannabis against cancer, they did still report that Cannabis appeared to have completely destroyed a human brain cancer implanted in the subject rat…
”He blinks thoughtfully, then turns to his computer. “However, let me show you something.” On his screen flash two MRI’s of a rats brain. The animal has a large mass lodged in the right hemisphere, caused by human brain cancer cells that Guzman’s researchers injected. He zooms in. The mass bulges hideously. The rat, I think, is a goner. “This particular animal was treated with THC for one week,” Guzman continues. “And this is what happened afterward.” The two images that now fill his screen are normal. The mass has not just shrunk, it’s disappeared. “As you can see, no tumour at all”.
If you can get passed the paywall, go see for yourselves…
National Geographic - Science seeks to unlock marijuana's secrets
But this is not new news. Not at all!
My first introduction to the idea that Cannabis cures cancer came not from anecdotal reports by cancer sufferers on chemo seeking to reduce nausea using Cannabis, or from the peer-reviewed science. My introduction to Cannabis as a cure for cancer came thanks to Bob Marley’s musical partner & fellow ex-Wailer, Peter Tosh.
In 1976, Tosh released his seminal album, Legalise It, & the title track includes the following lyric.
”Cure for cancer”.
In 1975, one year before Tosh released Legalise It, a peer-reviewed study into Cannabis use against cancer was published.
National Library of Medicine. 1975 - Antineoplastic activity of cannabinoids
Antineoplastic agents are drugs used to treat cancer. These medications contain chemicals that kill cells that rapidly divide such as cancer cells.”
from - Antineoplastic Chemotherapy
Given that this study was in 1975 it seems apparent that it influenced Peter Tosh in his lyrics for Legalise It, which came out a year later in 1976. I started taking song lyrics a little more seriously after discovering the paper that probably influenced Tosh.
AN also wonders how many young people, since 1975, have died from cancer that was never treated with Cannabinoids. It’s been nearly fifty years!
The CBD content of Cannabis, although it appears less useful in retardation of actual tumours, itself has an incredible anti-cancer action. CBD is antitumoral, which means that it prevents the spread of cancer through the human system.
”Antitumor antibiotics treat cancer by affecting the genetic material within cancerous cells. This prevents cancer cells from growing and spreading.”
from - What are antitumor antibiotics?
PS - It’s clear this article is referring to antibiotics but we’re only trying to show the meaning of the term “antitumoral.
National Library of Medicine - Cannabidiol inhibits human glioma cell migration through a cannabinoid receptor-independent mechanism
So, just to recap. Firstly, Cannabis has been known as a treatment for epileptic seizures & is especially useful in childhood seizures, since the late 1940’s at least. In 1975 a peer-reviewed paper, which likely influenced Legalise It by Peter Tosh from 1976, showed that the THC content of Cannabis retards the growth of cancerous tumours. In more recent times, the same has been shown by Manuel Guzman, Spanish Cannabis scientist who’s spent decades studying the drug, & whose success is reported, along with caveats, in National Geographic in 2015. British Sugar in Norfolk grows vast amounts of Cannabis & sells it to GW Pharma, who just happen to be investigating Cannabis as an oncological or anti-cancer medicine. In 2005 the CBD content of Cannabis showed it’s use in preventing the spread of cancer through the human system.
Numerous articles like this can be found using a search engine… Here’s one on mainstream media & one on youtube. There are hundreds if not thousands if not more reports like this…
The Daily Mail - Cancer-stricken woman's disease vanished... only to return when 49-year-old stopped taking cannabis oil and magic mushrooms
AN is well aware of the incessant reportage regarding Cannabis use in teenagers & their propensity towards psychosis. When discussing Cannabis use for either recreation or for health, we are often presented with claims that Cannabis drives it’s users crazy, makes them lazy & disinterested in normal life or gives them brain or lung cancer. There is no evidence to suggest Cannabis causes cancer but there is evidence to suggest that in extremely rare cases psychosis can result from it’s use in younger people. AN discourages all/any drugs use in young people!
If it’s true that Cannabis causes psychosis in younger users but it’s also true that Cannabis can cure cancer, the risks to younger people’s mental health will pale into insignificance once it’s use in cancer becomes more widely known & accepted. Without meaning the dismiss the horrors of the rare, mentally unwell teens, the actions of Cannabis against cancer are a far, far bigger deal. We accept all sorts of side-effects from all sorts of medicines & vaccines (!) & the risks they pose because their benefits outweigh their risks. Once the fact that Cannabis cures cancer becomes as well known as the risks it poses to teenage mental health, the risks to teenage mental health are going to be roundly dismissed in favour of saving lives from cancer.
Thanks for reading.
If this be true, given the post-injection-of-Covid-vax correlation with turbo cancer.......time to get some seeds and start growing!