textfiles/drugs/MARYJANE/marijref.drg

Find a Health Sci/Medical Library and get this article:

Mikuriya, Tod H. and Aldrich, Micheal R., "Cannabis 1988 Old Drug, New
Dangers, The Potency Debate", Journal of Psychoactive Drugs, Vol 20(1), Jan-
Mar, 1988 pg 47.

Summary and Conclusions:

Observation of the real world of social and marijuana use,
where autotitration is the norm, renders the scare tactics of
the _new_marijuana_ proponets not only inaccurate but 
irrelevant (*). There is much published evidence about the
availability of highly potent varieties of cannabis from the
ninetheenth century through the present day.  The effects
attributed to the _new_marijuana_ are the same ones debated
for centuries in many different cultures.  The assertion that
"all marijuana research to date has been done on 1 or 2 
percent THC material" (Cohen 1968) ignores several thousand
years of human experience with the drug.  The old 
medical cannabis extracts were stronger than most of the
forms now available, though the potency of illicit hash oils
by the mid-1970's was approaching the level of medicinal 
preparations available before their removal from the USP.
    While it may be true that sinsemilla is more widely
available than 10 or 15 years ago, its potency has not
changed significantly from the 2.4 to 9.5 percent THC
materials available in 1973-1974 (see Table I), or the five
to 14 percent sinsemilla of 1975 (Perry 1977).  The range of
potencies available then (marijuana at 0.1% to 7.8% THC,
averaging 2.0% to 5.0% THC by 1975) was approximately
the same as that reported now.  With such a range, the
evidence simply cannot support the argument by Cohen
(1986) that marijuana is "ten or more times more potent
than the product smoked ten years ago."  And to say that
marijaua potency has increased 1,400 percent since _any_
date in history is patent nonsense.
    It is not legitimate to imply that _average_ low potencies
represent the _full_range_ of potencies available in reality.
Neither is it valid to cite the _low_end_of_the_range_then_ as a
baseline to compare with the _high_end_of_the_range_now_.
The claimed baseline for THC content in the early 1970's
would appear to be too low, probably because confiscated,
stored police samples were utilized; and this low baseline
makes the claimed difference in potency appear to be
greater than it has been in reality.
    In sum, the _new_marijaua_ is not new and neither is the
hyperbole surrounding this issue.  The implications of the
new disinformation campaign are serious.  Many people,
particularly the experienced users of the 1960's and their
children, will once again shrug off the warnings of drug
experts and not heed more reasonable admonishments
about more dangerous drugs.  This is not only abusive to
those who look to science, the medical profession, and
government for intelligent leadership, but will sully the
repuatations of drug educators who wittingly cry wolf, and
will inevitably diminish the credibility of drug abuse
treatment professionals who pass on such flawed reports.

(* end quote *)

[*] my only critisism of this article is that they included this
    reference to auto-titration.  Auto-titration is irrelevant in
    light of the fact that they show that the potency has not changed.
    Mentioning autotitration only serves to cloud the issue, since 
    there is some controversy over it.    - Lamont

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From:  den0@midway.uchicago.edu 

Anonymous sent me the abstract and asked that I post it.

Marijuana as Antiemetic Medicine: A Survey of Oncologists' Experiences and
Attitudes

by Richard Doblin and Mark A. R. Kleiman

Abstract: A random-sample anonymous survey of the members of the American
Society of Clinical Oncology (ASCO) was conducted in the spring of 1990
measuring the attitudes and experiences of American oncologists concerning
the antiemetic use of marijuana in cancer chemotherapy patients.  The
survey was mailed to about one-third (N = 2430) of all U.S.-based ASCO
members and yielded a response rate of 43% (1035).  More than 44% of the
respondents report recommending the (illegal) use of marijuana for the
control of emesis to at least one cancer chemotherapy patient.  Almost
half (48%) would prescribe marijuana to some of their patients if it were
legal.  As a group, respondents considered (smoked) marijuana to be
somewhat more effective than the legally available (oral) synthetic THC
(Marinol) and roughly as safe.  Of the respondents who expressed an opinion,
a majority (54%) thought marijuana should be available by prescription.
These results bear on the question of whether mariujana has a "currently
accepted medical use," an issue in an ongoing administrative and legal
dispute concerning whether marijuana in smoked form should be available
by prescription along with synthetic THC in oral form.  This survey
demonstrates that oncologists' experience with the medical use of marijuana
is more extensive, and their opinions of it more favorable, than the
regulatory authorities appear to have believed.

---------

(End quote.)

The above was printed w/o permission, and I don't know where the
study will be (has been?) published.

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But if you are interested in more information on Marijuana Potency you might
want to find:

ElSohly, M.A.,Holley,J.H.,Lewis,G.S.,Russell,M.H., and Turner,C.E.,
"Constituents of Cannabis sativa L.XXIV: The Potency of Confiscated Marijuana,
Hashish, and Hash Oil Over a Ten-Year Period,"
Journal of Forensic Sciences, Vol. 29, No. 2, April 1984, pp.500-514.

This is the report of the Potency Monitoring Program of NIDA/DEA.

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TI: Cannabinoid receptor gene cloned.
AU: Goodwin-FK
SO: JAMA, The Journal of the American Medical Association, Sept 19, 1990, v264, n11, p1389(1).
AB: Tetrahydrocannabinol (THC) is the psychologically active agent in
    marijuana. Recent studies have indicated that specialized receptors for
    THC exist on brain cells. Now researchers at the United States National
    Institutes of Health have announced that they have been able to clone
    the gene responsible for the production of the receptor.  This should
    lead to the development of mammalian tissue culture models of the
    interaction between the THC molecule and the brain, which in turn could
    lead to the development of new pharmaceutical agents that can deliver the
    pain-killing, anticonvulsant and other effects of THC without the known
    side effects of the drug. Marijuana is used to treat glaucoma, a condition
    of increased fluid pressure within the eyeball, and in some cases to
    relieve nausea during chemotherapy.

TI: Marijuana receptor gene cloned [news]
AU: Marx-J
SO: Science. 1990 Aug 10; 249(4969): 624-6

TI: Planning for serendipity.
AU: Synder-SH
SO: Nature, August 9, 1990, v346, n6284, p508(1).

TI: Structure of a cannabinoid receptor and functional expression of the cloned cDNA
AU: Matsuda-LA; Lolait-SJ; Brownstein-MJ; Young-AC; Bonner-TI
SO: Nature. 1990 Aug 9; 346(6284): 561-4
AB: Marijuana and many of its constituent cannabinoids influence the central
    nervous system (CNS) in a complex and dose-dependent manner. Although CNS
    depression and analgesia are well documented effects of the cannabinoids,
    the mechanisms responsible for these and other cannabinoid-induced effects
    are not so far known. The hydrophobic nature of these substances has
    suggested that cannabinoids resemble anaesthetic agents in their action,
    that is, they nonspecifically disrupt cellular membranes. Recent evidence,
    however, has supported a mechanism involving a G protein-coupled receptor
    found in brain and neural cell lines, and which inhibits adenylate cyclase
    activity in a dose-dependent, stereoselective and pertussis toxin-sensitive
    manner. Also, the receptor is more responsive to psychoactive cannabinoids
    than to non-psychoactive cannabinoids. Here we report the cloning and
    expression of a complementary DNA that encodes a G protein-coupled receptor
    with all of these properties. Its messenger RNA is found in cell lines and
    regions of the brain that have cannabinoid receptors. These findings
    suggest that this protein is involved in cannabinoid-induced CNS effects
    (including alterations in mood and cognition) experienced by users of
    marijuana.

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 look in OMNI magazine, October 88 or 89 I beleive.
 This researcher found the receptors in the brain that THC acts upon,
 an unusually large amount of frontal receptors, with no damage even
 after heavy long term exposure...in other words, completely invalidating
 dr heathbar's bogus studies.  I had it and lost it...but a quick
 search in the library reference system crossedw with OMNI will
 turn it up.  This is real stuff.  You should read it.

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i don't have the article here, but there was a recent story in _the journal
of nih research_ about the effects on children of mothers that smoked pot.
the dean of the boston university school of nursing went to jamacia where
about 100% of the men and 10% of the women participate in rastafarianism,
which involves 10 to 50(?) spliffs of pot a week.  (even on the low end,
this is Heavy pot use.)  mothers who smoked had children that performed,
tested from age 0 to 5, either the same or Better than mothers who didn't
smoke.  the article surmised that perhaps the mothers that smoked had better
living conditions, somehow, and that was the cause of the improvement, not
the pot itself.

=============================================================================

Date: Wed, 27 Oct 1993 12:09:26 -0400 (EDT)
From: Jonathan Kamien <JKAMIEN@UVMVM.BITNET>
Sender: ALCOHOL & DRUG STUDIES <ALCOHOL@LMUACAD.BITNET>
Message-id: <01H4M0QKTW528WVZ42@YMIR.Claremont.Edu>

A pretty recent article might be a reasonable place to start:


Block, R.I. and Ghoneim, M.M.
Effects of chronic marijuana use on human cognition. Psychopharmacology
1993:110, 219-228

While this single article shouldn't be considered THE definitive answer,
it reviews the relevant literature pretty well.  Another source would be
to look at the more recent NIDA Research Mongraphs. You might look at
this, too:

 Kelly, T.H., Foltin, R.W. and Fischman, M.W. Effects of smoked marijuana
 on heart rate, drug ratings and task performance by humans
 Behavioural Pharmacology 1993,4:167-17

I hope this gets you pointed in the right direction.