Cannabis fails to slow progress of multiple sclerosis in UK study
Cannabis capsules failed to slow the progression of multiple sclerosis in a large British study, dealing a blow to hopes that the drug could provide long-term benefits for patients with the debilitating nerve disease.
Despite promising signs in earlier, shorter studies, researchers found patients who took capsules containing tetrahydrocannabinol (THC), a key active ingredient in cannabis, fared no better than those given a placebo.
The finding is a disappointment for researchers who thought cannabis might provide a viable therapy in the disease’s secondary progressive stage, when patients have few treatment options.
Multiple sclerosis (MS) patients were assessed in the trial known as CUPID (cannabinoid use in progressive inflammatory brain disease) on both a disability scale administered by neurologists and another based on their own reporting.
“Overall the study found no evidence to support an effect of THC on MS progression in either of the main outcomes,” researchers led by John Zajicek of the Peninsula College of Medicine and Dentistry, Plymouth University, said.
Results from the study, which was funded by Britain’s Medical Research Council, will be presented at the Association of British Neurologists’ annual meeting in Brighton later on Tuesday.
Scientific Research Supports Medical Cannabis
Between 1840 and 1900, European and American medical journals published more than 100 articles on the therapeutic use of the drug known then as Cannabis Indica (or Indian hemp) and now simply as cannabis.
Today, new studies are being published in peer-reviewed journals that demonstrate cannabis has medical value in treating patients with serious illnesses such as AIDS, glaucoma, cancer, multiple sclerosis, epilepsy, and chronic pain.
The safety of the drug has been attested to by numerous studies and reports, including the LaGuardia Report of 1944, The Schafer Commission Report of 1972, a 1997 study conducted by the British House of Lords, the Institutes of Medicine report of 1999, research sponsored by Health Canada, and numerous studies conducted in the Netherlands, where it has been quasi-legal since 1976 and is available from pharmacies by prescription.
Recent published research on CD4 immunity in AIDS patients found no compromise to the immune systems of patients undergoing cannabis therapy in clinical trials.
The use of medical cannabis has been endorsed by numerous professional organizations, including the American Academy of Family Physicians, the American Public Health Association, and the American Nurses Association.
Its use is supported by such leading medical publications as The New England Journal of Medicine and The Lancet.
Cannabis contains more than 60 different cannabinoids, of which THC is thought to be the most active, and many MS patients have long said the drug helps them cope with the effects of the disease.
Drug companies, too, have been interested in cannabis as a medicine. Britain’s GW Pharmaceuticals, working with Bayer and Almirall, recently started selling an under-the-tongue cannabis spray called Sativex to relieve spasticity.
Is cannabis safe to recommend?
“The smoking of cannabis, even long term, is not harmful to health….” So began a 1995 editorial statement of Great Britain’s leading medical journal, The Lancet. The long history of human use of cannabis also attests to its safety - nearly 5,000 years of documented use without a single death. In the same year as the Lancet editorial, Dr. Lester Grinspoon, a professor emeritus at Harvard Medical School who has published many influential books and articles on medical use of cannabis, had this to say in an article in the Journal of the American Medical Association (1995):
“One of marihuana’s greatest advantages as a medicine is its remarkable safety. It has little effect on major physiological functions. There is no known case of a lethal overdose; on the basis of animal models, the ratio of lethal to effective dose is estimated as 40,000 to 1. By comparison, the ratio is between 3 and 50 to 1 for secobarbital and between 4 and 10 to 1 for ethanol. Marihuana is also far less addictive and far less subject to abuse than many drugs now used as muscle relaxants, hypnotics, and analgesics. The chief legitimate concern is the effect of smoking on the lungs. Cannabis smoke carries even more tars and other particulate matter than tobacco smoke. But the amount smoked is much less, especially in medical use, and once marihuana is an openly recognized medicine, solutions may be found; ultimately a technology for the inhalation of cannabinoid vapors could be developed.”
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As Dr. Grinspoon notes, “the greatest danger in medical use of marihuana is its illegality, which imposes much anxiety and expense on suffering people, forces them to bargain with illicit drug dealers, and exposes them to the threat of criminal prosecution.” This was the same conclusion reached by the House of Lords report, which recommended rescheduling and decriminalization.
David Nutt, professor of neuropsychopharmacology at Imperial College London, who was not involved in the latest research, said the study’s failure did not mean cannabis had no role in helping MS patients.
“It would be wrong to interpret these preliminary findings to mean that cannabis does not achieve its licensed use. Cannabis is not licensed for limiting disease progression, it is licensed for dealing with spasticity and pain,” he said.