A number of recent studies have confirmed the cancer-fighting, tumor-shrinking value of medical marijuana. 

Although the first study to demonstrate that cannabis has anti-carcinogenic properties was done  back in 1974 by the U.S. National Institute of Health, more recent studies, which began abroad in 1999, have shown that cannabis can effectively and safely treat many forms of cancer. 

Since 1999, there have now been a number of studies that clearly demonstrate that cannabis has the ability to effectively shrink tumors, kill cancer cells, and safely treat many aggressive forms of cancer, including brain, breast, skin, prostate, and lung cancer. 

However, due to the political controversy that surrounds medical marijuana, some physicians still remain unaware of these valuable studies, and mistakenly believe the misguided government reports that cannabis actually causes cancer. In some cases, it may be important to educate your doctor about the important research discussed in this column.

A study done at UCLA in 2006 showed that not only does smoking marijuana not cause lung cancer, as had been previously thought, but that smoking cannabis actually protects the lungs from cancer. The study followed four groups of subjects: nonsmokers, cannabis-only smokers, tobacco-only smokers, and cannabis and tobacco smokers. 

The results showed that nonsmokers and cannabis-only smokers had the same amount of lung cancer, and that tobacco-only smokers had the highest rate of lung cancer. Those subjects that smoked both cannabis and tobacco had significantly less lung cancer than those who just smoked tobacco. In other words, smoking cannabis actually had a protective effect on the tobacco smokers’ lungs.

Recent talks by medical marijuana expert Valerie Corral at the Santa Cruz Wo/Men’s Alliance for Medical Marijuana (WAMM) meetings have focused on the valuable medical properties of highly-refined, therapeutic cannabis oil, which may be the most powerful cancer-fighting agent that has been developed from the cannabis plant to date.

Cannabis oil, also commonly known as “golden oil” or “honey oil,” is a concentrated extract from the cannabis plant that is highly refined and chemically standardized, so that the amount of bioactive components (known as “cannabinoids”) in the oil are of a consistent strength. The clear-golden oil is a resinous matrix of cannabinoids, which is similar to dark-colored hash oil, only more distilled and much more potent.

Rick Simpson, founder of Phoenix Tears, an organization which studies and promotes the medical use of cannabis oil, has become a leading spokesperson for the medicinal value of cannabis oil, after effectively treating himself with the oil to help heal from a serious head injury in 1997. For years, Simpson has been supplying the valuable oil to medical marijuana patients free of charge. According to Simpson, many of the cancer patients who have used his oil were cured or vastly improved, and that many other illnesses have been effectively treated with the oil as well.

Although the medical establishment and the mainstream media have largely ignored the evidence that cannabis oil has powerful cancer-fighting properties, it appears that this silence is beginning to end as more and more people are discovering the truth about this forbidden medicine.

For example, according to ABC News, a father in Montana, Mike Hyde, claims that cannabis oil helped to cure his two-year-old son of a stage 4, malignant brain tumor on his optic nerve. Hyde said that he secretly slipped cannabis oil into his son Cash’s feeding tube out of desperation, after the boy’s chemotherapy treatments were making him too sick to eat. According to ABC News, Cash, who is now 3 years old, has made “a miraculous recovery.”

Spanish researcher Manuel Guzman has done a whole series of studies since 1999 demonstrating the efficacy of cannabinoids to fight cancer. Studies have demonstrated that (isolated chemical components of cannabis), such as THC (tetrahydrocannibinal) and CBD (cannabidiol), can  shrink tumors, and some reports suggest that the whole plant extracts are more effective than the isolated cannabinoids.

There is evidence that not only do some cannabinoids kill cancer cells, they cause healthy new cell growth in the brain--a process known as “neurogenesis”--and that the cannabinoids may have a protective effect on the nervous system as well.

WAMM is currently working with physicians and biochemists to develop the use of this enchanted oil further. Cannabis oil is extremely nontoxic, and unlike every pharmaceutical drug that is approved to treat cancer, there are no serious health risks associated with using it. In all of human history, no one has ever died from a cannabis overdose. It is arguably the safest, therapeutically-active drug known. 

Cannabis oil can be vaporized, orally ingested with other oils, or used topically. Oral ingestion will produce the strongest effects, and would likely be the most effective for serious medical conditions.

And yes, the oil is also quite psychoactive. It can make you very high, and it can even bring on a full-blown psychedelic experience.  I think that this (often-sought and sometimes-criticized) aspect of the healing herb’s effects should not be disregarded, trivialized, ridiculed, or (Heaven forbid) removed. I suspect that that the well-known mental effects--an improved mood and transcendent perspective--are vital aspects of the healing mind/body magic that cannabis can provide.

To find out more about cannabis oil see: http://phoenixtears.ca/

To find out more about WAMM see: www.wamm.org

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