Peter Reynolds Blog

Tuesday 18 Jan 2011

The re-scheduling of Sativex, the cannabis tincture marketed by GW
Pharmaceuticals is causing huge embarrassment at the Home Office.

Everybody's been able to go along with the white lie up to now that
Sativex is some sort of highly complex, super scientific, super
medicine containing cannabinoids. True enough, GW Pharma has put
millions into development and testing in order to jump through the
hoops the government has demanded. At the end of the day though, all
Sativex consists of is a tincture, an alcohol extract of herbal
cannabis. It's made simply by gently heating a blend of herbal
cannabis in ethanol and then adding a little peppermint oil to taste.

An Honourable Man?

The Medicines and Healthcare Products Regulatory Agency (MHRA) has
approved Sativex for the treatment of muscle spasticity in MS. I
understand that an approval for the treatment of cancer pain is
expected shortly. The problem for the Home Office is that Sativex now
has to be re-scheduled under the Misuse of Drugs Act 1971. Cannabis is
presently in schedule one as having no medicinal value. The Advisory
Council on the Misuse of Drugs (ACMD) has recommended this week that
Sativex be in schedule four, alongside a variety of minor
tranquilisers. However, as the ACMD says, "it will not be appropriate
to refer to "Sativex", which is a proprietary name, in any amendment
to the misuse of drugs regulations, and that a suitable description of
the relevant component(s) of "Sativex" will have to be scheduled."

This is going to be tough for James Brokenshire to face up to. GW
specifies that Sativex contains approximately equal proportions of THC
and CBD but that’s not the whole truth. It also contains as many as
400 other cannabinoids which occur naturally in the plant (nobody is
exactly sure how many cannabinoids there are and what their effects
are). You see there's not really any other accurate way of
describing Sativex except to call it cannabis. So how can Mr
Brokenshire possibly move it to schedule four? He endlessly repeats
the propaganda that "there are no medicinal benefits in cannabis".

Either Mr Brokenshire has to come clean and accept that his past
position was incorrect or he has to promote some further deception.

I trust he will prove to be an honourable man.

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