New Study Shows How Marijuana
Eases Pain;
Will Someone Do A Study On How The Suppression of Medical Marijuana Causes Pain?
(Marijuananews note: This is just one more piece
of the rapidly mounting evidence that the suppression of medical marijuana has caused
– and continues to cause -- immeasurable human suffering.)October 11, 1999
Study Shows How Marijuana Affects Pain
See
British Medical
Association News Actually Gives Prize For Letter Supporting Medical Marijuana
and
HHS Rules That
California Patients Have A Right To Adequate Pain Medication
– Context For Medical Marijuana
and
ABC News Medical
Writer Strongly Backs Medical Marijuana,
Blasts "the irresponsible, indefensible and unforgivable tactics
used to prevent people in severe pain from using marijuana as a medicine."
and
"Rock keeps
talking about doing trials, but trials have already been done. There is already sufficient
proof that cannabis helps people deal with their pain." -- Ontario Arthritic Facing
Marijuana Charge.
"My death will be slow and painful. Now, I have this criminal charge against me,
and my children are about to lose their daddy over it."
and
Veterans
Administration Leads New Effort In Treating Pain.
That's Odd; The Prohibitionists Told Us That Pain Is Being Adequately Treated.
and links
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Pain triggers the release of the brain's natural version of
marijuana, researchers said Monday.
Their finding helps explain why marijuana can act to relieve pain
and adds to a whole series of studies that show the chemical, one of a class known as
anandamides, has a range of important roles in the brain.
Michael Walker, a psychology professor at Brown University in Providence, Rhode Island,
and colleagues tested pain and anandamide in rats.
They found the brain produced anandamide when they stimulated an area -- the
periaqueductal gray -- known for its role in modulating pain. It also released anandamide
in response to a painful injection of the chemical formalin.
The secretion of anandamide eased the pain, they reported in the Proceedings of the
National Academy of Sciences.
The researchers anesthetized their rats, but were able to follow the pain signals and
the passage of anandamide in the brain using a new type of mass spectrometry, which is
able to detect minute amounts of a substance.
Walker said the knowledge might be used to devise new painkillers
or analgesics. Perhaps a drug that made more anandamide available would be useful, he
said.
(Marijuananews note: Actually, it will be used as an excuse to arrest more sick people
who use medical marijuana. But then everything is used as an excuse to arrest more sick
people who use medical marijuana.)
"There are some types of pain that do not respond well to current treatments,'' he
said in a statement. ``The fact that you have different modulatory systems that are
effective for different types of pain may offer hope.''
Anandamides are neurotransmitters -- message-carrying chemicals -- and are known to be
chemically very similar to cannabinoids in cannabis or marijuana.
Cannabis has been used for centuries to help relieve pain.
(Marijuananews note: The Wall Street Journal actually carried a column in 1997 by the
prohibitionist propagandist Gabriel Nahas saying, "THC (or marihuana) does not
interfere directly with the endorphin system. Indeed, it increases the perception of
pain. Dr. Kassirer declares it "hypocritical" to forbid a physician to
prescribe marihuana yet allow him to prescribe morphine for the relief of pain. If he
means to imply that marihuana is analgesic, he is simply wrong."
See
Nahas versus
Kassirer
Other research has found a range of uses for anandamides.
In May, researchers at the University of California at Irvine found that people with
schizophrenia have twice the normal levels anandamide in their brains.
Anandamides have also been found to help regulate body movement and coordination, and
may also be important in helping sperm get to and fertilize an egg.
Supported