Pot(s) and Ban(s)

Pot(s) and Ban(s)

   There must be something mainstream when you appear on the cover of magazines as diverse as National Geographic and Fortune, as well as Time and The Week.  The irony is, you're famous, but not in a good way since you're illegal.  In fact, the U.S. government considers you as dangerous as heroin.  But a majority of the U.S. wants you.  In fact, even big-time drug dealers in Mexico now want you.  Is it the billions of dollars that you generate?  Probably, but there's something even more attractive about you, despite your age.

   A weed is a weed is a weed; that is, unless you really are the real thing...weed.  Marijuana, ganja and dozens of other culturally popular names have made "weed" suddenly quite popular, and mostly for reasons not commonly associated with it.  Thousands of years ago, there is evidence that the Chinese already knew this, for marijuana has been discovered in their medical dispensaries.  And according to an article in National Geographic, there are more examples of what researchers hope could be our new Amazon forest-like drug: The seizures started in May 2013 when she was six months old.  Infantile spasms, they were called.  It looked like a startle reflex—her arms rigid at her side, her face a frozen mask of fear, her eyes fluttering from side to side.  Addelyn Patrick’s little brain raced and surged, as though an electromagnetic storm were sweeping through it.  “It’s your worst possible nightmare,” her mother, Meagan, says.  “Just awful, awful, awful to watch your child in pain, in fear, and there’s nothing you can do to stop it.”...These epileptic seizures, they concluded, were the result of a congenital brain malformation called schizencephaly.  One of the hemispheres of Addy’s brain had not developed fully in utero, leaving an abnormal cleft.  She also had a related condition called optic nerve hypoplasia, which caused her eyes to wander—and which, further tests revealed, made her all but blind.  By summer Addy was having 20 to 30 seizures a day.  Then 100 a day.  Then 300.  “Everything was misfiring all at once,” says Meagan. “We were afraid we were going to lose her.”...The Patricks followed the advice they’d been given and heavily medicated Addy with anticonvulsants.  The powerful meds reduced her seizures, but they also put her to sleep for almost the entire day.  “Addy was gone,” Meagan says.  “She just lay there, sleeping all the time. Like a rag doll.”  Meagan quit her job as a third-grade teacher to care for her daughter.  Over nine months Addy was hospitalized 20 times....\When Meagan’s in-laws suggested they look into medical marijuana, she recoiled.  “This is a federally illegal drug we are talking about,” she recalls thinking.  But she did her own research.  A good deal of anecdotal evidence shows that high-CBD strains of cannabis can have a strong antiseizure effect.  The medical literature, though scant, goes back surprisingly far.  In 1843 a British doctor named William O’Shaughnessy published an article detailing how cannabis oil had arrested an infant’s relentless convulsions...In September 2013 the Patricks met with Elizabeth Thiele, a pediatric neurologist at Boston’s Massachusetts General Hospital who’s helping lead a study of CBD in treating refractory childhood epilepsy.   Legally, Thiele could not prescribe cannabis to Addy or even recommend it.  But she strongly advised the Patricks to consider all medical options...Meagan experimented with high-CBD oil. The seizures all but stopped.

   The key words here might be "federally illegal drug," for currently marijuana is classified as a Schedule I drug, the same classification as heroin, a classification that makes it a dangerous substance with no medical value.  Research on the drug stopped when this designation arrived in 1970 and the "war on drugs" began (ironically, George Washington used to grow marijuana, although supposedly only for its hemp properties).  Marijuana growth was encouraged by the U.S. during WW II when the value of the stringy stems were proven exceptional for making rope and other fabrics (up until the illegal designation arrived, you could often still see marijuana plants along the sides of roads near farms that had grown the crop, the stray seeds still blowing in the wind...the U.S.continues to import hemp from China and Canada because of its ban on growing it).  Hemp seeds are high in protein and antioxidants, and hemp oil is proving equally valuable (a few U.S. Senators are introducing a bill to remove some of the federal restrictions to allow research into the medical properties of marijuana). 

   And the long ban on the use of marijuana almost inevitably proved an opening for sometimes amateur chemists to create a legal synthetic version of the drug.  Often seen as Spice, LOL and other catchy names, the legal mixture of chemicals and plant mulch led to over 11,000 emergency room visits in 2010;  the next year, that number jumped to nearly 30,000.  And with each bill that came to ban a version of this "legal" smoke, a new chemical variation would arrive;  the appearance of marketing the product to children finally led to a general ban on such substances and the subsequent arrest of over 375 importers of the products, which caused a general decline in demand in all states except Texas (which continues to see usage increase, likely due to similar products now arriving from Mexico). 

   Part of the synthetic pot problem is that there is no regulation or oversight of the product, a stark contrast to current marijuana plant production (in states that have legalized it) where every seed and step of the growing process (even the harvesting) is monitored by cameras, scanners and scales.  Scientists looking to get a few plants for medical research must jump through dozens of hoops and account for virtually every ounce of the plants.  But investors are catching on, seeing the potential and readying themselves for nationwide legalization.  Here's how Fortune, in an article by Jennifer Alsaver, portrayed the changing mood: Today at least seven small financial firms, such as Posei­don Asset Management, Salveo Capital, and Emerald Ocean, are raising money to fund pot companies.  Even some family offices are investing, according to Viridian Capital Advisors, a firm that tracks the category...“The industry is losing its taint as a drug industry and is becoming a much more sophisticated market,” says Scott Greiper, Viridian’s president.  Advanced lighting, soil, and cultivation systems are being developed.  Data analytics promise to reveal what’s selling at retail and track marijuana from seed to sale.  Biotech companies are trying to pinpoint the strains of cannabinoid that can benefit diabetes, epilepsy, and glaucoma.  Those advances, he says, are in turn attracting more seasoned investors...Like any other market, pot now has an industry association, trade publications, women’s entrepreneurship conferences, vocational schools (for growers), and a 13-week startup accelerator program called ­CanopyBoulder.  This year CanopyBoulder will help 20 cannabis startups launch, offering $20,000 investments for 9.5% stakes...There are marijuana-focused services like law firms, public relations firms, marketers, accountants, insurance companies—even janitorial services.  They tout special knowledge about cannabis regulation or, in the case of the janitors, expertise in odor containment.

   Way, way back in the mid-1980s, I had lunch with a pot grower; his operation back in North Carolina was quite large for the time, and he and two other growers with similarly large operations had already been invited and met by the then three major tobacco firms' people.  "They wanted to pick our brains," he told me, "to see what made the plants grow but on a commercial scale...they want to be ready for when it's legalized."  Today, the strains are indeed commercialize; this agricultural product is big business and today's strains are getting so specific and so strong that reports say the flow of marijuana from Mexico is showing signs of reversing and now going from the U.S. into Mexico.  NPR's John Burnett did a story in 2014 about this trend when it was just beginning: DEA spokesman Lawrence Payne tells NPR that Sinaloa operatives in the United States are reportedly buying high-potency American marijuana in Colorado and smuggling it back into Mexico for sale to high-paying customers.  "It makes sense," Payne says.  "We know the cartels are already smuggling cash into Mexico.  If you can buy some really high-quality weed here, why not smuggle it south, too, and sell it at a premium?"..."The Sinaloa cartel has demonstrated in many instances that it can adapt.  I think it's in a process of redefinition toward marijuana," says Javier Valdez, a respected journalist and author who writes books on the narcoculture in Sinaloa.  Valdez says he's heard through the grapevine that marijuana planting has dropped 30 percent in the mountains of Sinaloa. 

   There are several significant distinctions between marijuana that is psychotropic (ladened with the chemical tetrahydrocannabinol or THC) and the medical-side chemical, cannabidiol, which has almost no THC (the plants can be cultivated with or without the specific chemical).  Medical geneticists argue that it seems cannabidiol does have the ability to do everything from make tumors shrink (and in some cases, disappear...this was done on rats and human trials are set to begin) to relieving muscle spasms in  patients with multiple sclerosis (Canada and Europe have already approved such extracts for patients' use, however such extracts are still illegal in the U.S.).  But current research is suggesting that marijuana, while seeming to produce a "high" in adult brains, may actually cause damage in the brains of children and teens, leading some legislators to propose further age restrictions even in states where marijuana usage is legal (currently, you must be 21 to purchase legal marijuana).

   But the billions of dollars are proving a bit too enticing; and for the first time, polls show that a majority of Americans favor the legalization of marijuana.  Perhaps such a change in laws might make a few people rich; but more importantly, such a change in laws might allow more research into what cures or relief might await patients currently out of patience, out of drugs, and almost out of hope...and all of it might lie hidden in a plant that has been sitting right in front of us for centuries.