NEWS-UK MS patients to test cannabis medicines

[Judith Richards <judithr@xxxxxxxx>]

UK patients to test cannabis medicines
 By Giles Elgood

LONDON, Apr 06, 2000 (Reuters) -- Britain's medical authorities have
authorised the first clinical trials of cannabis-based medicines for
patients with multiple sclerosis (MS) and severe pain.

Sufferers from diseases such as MS, which attacks the central nervous
system, have been
calling for a pain-relieving cannabis medicine for years and many have
broken the law by
buying the drug from street dealers.

The company running the trials, GW Pharmaceuticals, believes them to be
the first of their
kind in the world. It said if they were successful, the British
government had indicated
it would change the law banning possession of cannabis, and that
prescription drugs could be
marketed as early as 2003.

They will start shortly at the Pain Relief Clinic at the James Paget
Hospital, Great Yarmouth, in eastern England, under the supervision of
Dr Willy Notcutt.

``Our aim is to test some of the claims which have been made for the
medicinal qualities
of cannabis in a structured clinical research programme,'' Notcutt said.

Patients will take different formulations of cannabis-based medicines
using devices that spray them under the tongue and allow them to be
absorbed directly into the bloodstream.

About 2,000 patients will take part in the trial, details of which can
be found on the website www.medicinal-cannabis.org.

Guy said there was considerable evidence to suggest that cannabis may
have other medical uses in addition to pain relief for MS sufferers.

``We are now well on the way to demonstrating this in a controlled
clinical
research environment,'' he said.

GW Pharmaceuticals has been growing cannabis in secure,
computer-controlled glasshouses in
southern England under a license from the British Home Office (Interior
Ministry). Although
the plants are the same as those grown for recreational use -- cannabis
sativa -- the trials
are designed to maximise the drug's pain relieving effect rather than to
make users so high
that they do not care about the pain.

  Copyright © 2000 Reuters Limited.

--
Judith Richards, London, Ontario, Canada
judithr@xxxxxxxx
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