NEW Home For Cannabis Cure UK
Thank you all for the support so far throughout 2011 and into 2012. The news has continued to be exciting and the level of activism is continuing to build up.
This year is most certainly one that is going to be memorable for our community and culture!
Everyone working towards CannabisCureUK would like to invite you over to our new home CannabisCure.co.UK
We have stepped up our game and are working on plans to keep expanding our mission to spread the truth about cannabis, the science and policy that has left us in the situation we are now in, with growing severity.
Please come and visit, comment on and subscribe to CCUK, we would love to hear form you.
BREAKING NEWS: Cannabis Science, Inc: Cannabis Oil Shrinks “One Of The Worst” Cancers
View this story on our New Website
COLORADO’S pioneering biotech company Cannabis Science, Inc have released graphic photos of a patient, suffering with what their physician described as “the worst case of squamous cell carcinoma cancer” he had ever seen, being healed by cannabis oil administered at home.
From Skin Cancer.org “Squamous cell carcinoma (SCC) are the second most common form of skin cancer and are very small usually when they are first noticed. It is an uncontrolled growth of abnormal cells arising in the squamous cells, which compose most of the skin’s upper layers (the epidermis). SCCs often look like scaly red patches, open sores, or warts; they may crust or bleed. SCC is mainly caused by cumulative UV exposure over the course of a lifetime. It can become disfiguring and sometimes deadly if allowed to grow. An estimated 700,000 cases of SCC are diagnosed each year in the US, resulting in approximately 2,500 deaths.”
Cannabis After Radiot-Therapy Session
The first pictures released by Cannabis Science, Inc. show a tumour protruding the skull with two sinus-like holes in the top. Cannabis extract was then applied in and around the holes and to all of the surrounding tissue on the scalp whilst the patient was undergoing radiotherapy treatment which can be seen in the second photos. This kind of extract which contains cannabinoids such as THC and CBD is more commonly referred to as “hash oil” or “concentrate” in the fledging regulated cannabis industry in Colorado, most particularly, Denver. Colorado made it legal for patients with qualifying conditions, after citizens used ballot initiatives and petitions, to use Cannabis to treat their symptoms. MS, chronic pain and nausea are all qualifying conditions, not just life threatening ones.
Claims of cannabis’ ability to shrink tumours have been made for many years, but within the last decade the anecdotal evidence has stacked up to the point that pharmaceutical companies have started taking these claims more seriously. GW Pharmaceuticals, who are set to go global in 2012 with their cannabis tincture spray Sativex, are currently Phase III trialling their oromucosal mouth spray for cancer pain in both the UK and the US. It is already prescribed to a select number of MS suffers in parts of the UK and in continental Europe in countries such as Italy, Germany, Sweden and even Czech Republic this year.
What is visible in the next set of photos is what has been described as the cannabis oil being drawn out of the wound and, in the words of Cannabis Science, Inc., “killing the cancer cells from these lesions”. If this is “killing” the cancer cells then surely this must be an indication that the anecdotal claims and evidence that we have seen more of in the press so recently and many times in 2011, shows that cannabis does cure cancer.
Cannabis oil killing cancer
Back in 1974, researchers at the Medical College of Virginia in Richmond inadvertently found the THC slowed the growth of cancer cells in mice with cancer of the lung, breast and a virus-induced leukemia. Their funding ended since the original goal was to determine its harmful effects to the immune system. In 2000 Guzman and his research team in Madrid, Spain demonstrated that injected THC could shrink or destroy brain cell tumors (Glioma) in rats. The 1974 studies were never published and in recent years there has been little coverage in the U.S. about Guzman’s work.
In 2006 a Canadian man by the name of Rick Simpson dropped the film Run From The Cure on the cannabis world with claims and a full video guide of how to make a cure for cancer from whole plant cannabis extract. Since then he has become a modern icon for the movement and his video has been used to help reach hundreds of thousands, if not millions, who need help to treat not only cancer but diseases affecting every part of the human system. He is now on the run as a fugitive from the DEA of America.
For the full story goto: CannabisCure.co.uk
Cannabis IS Safer than Tobacco: Science Reveals (Again…)
On Tuesday, 10th of January 2011 a study – one of the most substantial of its kind, has been released by researchers at the University of Alabama, California and San Francisco in the Journal of the American Medical Association.
Dr. Stefan Kertesz
The Federally funded study “Association Between Marijuana Exposure and Pulmonary Function Over 20 Years” which took place over a 20-year time period”
has concluded that smoking cannabis once a week or even more does not harm the lungs, The Associated Press wrote.
The study mimics smaller ones carried out previously similar to that of Dr. Donald Tashkin, a medical professional whose name may and should ring a bell with some cannabis truth enthusiasts. Although he did not take part in the study he said “It’s not clear why that is so, but it’s possible that the main active ingredient in marijuana, a
chemical known as THC, makes the difference. THC causes the “high” that users feel. It also helps fight inflammation and may counteract the effects of more irritating chemicals in the drug” as an answer to why cannabis does not carry the same problems seen in tobacco users.
Dr. Donald Tashkin, is a marijuana researcher, professor of medicine at the University of California, Los Angeles has studied the effect of cannabis on lung cancer. Here is an interview conducted by Dr. Bob Malamede of Colorado Springs University. Tashkin reveals that there is even some indication of evidence in reduced cancer rates in those who use cannabis over those who smoke neither tobacco or cannabis.
Unlike cigarette smokers, marijuana users tend to breathe in deeply when they inhale a joint, which some researchers think might strengthen lung tissue. But the common lung function tests used in the study require the same kind of deep breathing that marijuana smokers are used to, so their good test results might partly reflect lots of practice, said Kertesz, a drug abuse researcher and preventative medicine specialist at the Alabama university.
One of the co-authors, Dr. Stefan Kertesz, suggested that there may be another reason for the better than expected results, the possibility that the nature of smoking cannabis and the method of inhaling deeply may have an accidentally beneficial side-effect.
The breathing test that was used in the experiment, a common one, uses similar lung function to that of cannabis smoking something that provides as a good practice. Bongs and water-pipes are much the desired and preferred item among many a toker/average patient.
While cannabis is Federally illegal the study was Federally funded, the analysis was paid for by the National Association of Drug Abuse. It will be interesting to see if it maintains its position on the harmfulness of smoking cannabis.
Smoking Cannabis Concentrates.
America has 16 states that have made exemptions in their state laws to allow patients with qualifying medial problems from being interfered with by the police. The main form of ingestion by over a million patients now is smoked and California was the first to sign into legislation Proposition 215 in 1996. One might imagine there would be reports by now of more significant lung damage being caused if this study is to be ignored.
In Britain and Europe cannabis is usually mixed with tobacco when smoked but in America the cannabis culture and medical community particularly alike have adopted combusting it pure, simply because tobacco is more harmful. It is the sad case in Europe that even those who do not smoke cigarettes fill half of their spliff with part of a cigarette or rolling tobacco, a harm problem inflicted by prohibition for many who do not have enough access to the cannabis they would like or require so it is cut with the more toxic and addictive legal substitute.
“Overall, about 37 percent reported at least occasional marijuana use,and most users also reported having smoked cigarettes; 17 percent of participants said they’d smoked cigarettes but not marijuana. Those results are similar to national estimates.”
With statistics like this it is surprising that The National Association on Drug Abuse aren’t calling for the two to be swapped if there is to be a smoked drug at all.
AP writes, “The study randomly enrolled 5,115 men and women aged 18 through 30 in four cities: Birmingham, Chicago, Oakland, Calif., and Minneapolis. Roughly equal numbers of blacks and whites took part, but no other minorities.”
However, the findings did suggest a slight decline in lung function in cannabis smokers but not enough evidence really to suggest anything significantly damaging. The analysis did note that this may be down to there not being enough heavier users in the test group.
The authors of the study did not recommend that smoking cannabis should be stopped but recommended “caution and moderation when marijuana use is considered.”
When comparing the typical American cannabis usage to that of a cigarette smoker’s daily habit Kertesz says tobacco users smoke an average of 9 cigarettes a day as apposed to the 3 or so joints a month of those using the still Federally illicit substance.
Analysts from NADA highlighted that tobacco use does lead to worse scores than even toking cannabis daily and that is why the choice of hippies, and rappers alike came out looking less demonic than the governments of around the world have made even them to be. Just as they have cannabis.
Arm yourself with the truth delivered by science and take it to the
debating ground whenever cannabis’ cancer causing or lung damaging
properties are claimed. This is the only way to challange the
non-believers and those adamant on spouting and repeating utter reefer
madness.
Association Between Marijuana Exposure and Pulmonary Function Over 20 Years
- Mark J. Pletcher, MD, MPH;
- Eric Vittinghoff, PhD;
- Ravi Kalhan, MD, MS;
- Joshua Richman, MD, PhD;
- Monika Safford, MD;
- Stephen Sidney, MD, MPH;
- Feng Lin, MS;
- Stefan Kertesz, MD
- Author Affiliations: Department of Epidemiology and Biostatistics (Drs Pletcher and Vittinghoff and Mr Lin) and Division of General Internal Medicine, Department of Medicine (Dr Pletcher), University of California, San Francisco; Asthma-COPD Program, Division of Pulmonary and Critical Care Medicine, Northwestern University Feinberg School of Medicine, Chicago, Illinois (Dr Kalhan); Department of Surgery (Dr Richman) and Division of Preventive Medicine (Drs Safford and Kertesz), University of Alabama at Birmingham; Center for Surgical, Medical and Acute Care Research and Transitions, Veterans Affairs Medical Center, Birmingham (Drs Richman and Kertesz); and Division of Research, Kaiser Permanente of Northern California, Oakland (Dr Sidney).
Abstract
Context Marijuana smoke contains many of the same constituents as tobacco smoke, but whether it has similar adverse effects on pulmonary function is unclear.
Objective To analyze associations between marijuana (both current and lifetime exposure) and pulmonary function.
Design, Setting, and Participants The Coronary Artery Risk Development in Young Adults (CARDIA) study, a longitudinal study collecting repeated measurements of pulmonary function and smoking over 20 years (March 26, 1985-August 19, 2006) in a cohort of 5115 men and women in 4 US cities. Mixed linear modeling was used to account for individual age-based trajectories of pulmonary function and other covariates including tobacco use, which was analyzed in parallel as a positive control. Lifetime exposure to marijuana joints was expressed in joint-years, with 1 joint-year of exposure equivalent to smoking 365 joints or filled pipe bowls.
Main Outcome Measures Forced expiratory volume in the first second of expiration (FEV1) and forced vital capacity (FVC).
Results Marijuana exposure was nearly as common as tobacco exposure but was mostly light (median, 2-3 episodes per month). Tobacco exposure, both current and lifetime, was linearly associated with lower FEV1 and FVC. In contrast, the association between marijuana exposure and pulmonary function was nonlinear (P < .001): at low levels of exposure, FEV1 increased by 13 mL/joint-year (95% CI, 6.4 to 20; P < .001) and FVC by 20 mL/joint-year (95% CI, 12 to 27; P < .001), but at higher levels of exposure, these associations leveled or even reversed. The slope for FEV1 was −2.2 mL/joint-year (95% CI, −4.6 to 0.3; P = .08) at more than 10 joint-years and −3.2 mL per marijuana smoking episode/mo (95% CI, −5.8 to −0.6; P = .02) at more than 20 episodes/mo. With very heavy marijuana use, the net association with FEV1 was not significantly different from baseline, and the net association with FVC remained significantly greater than baseline (eg, at 20 joint-years, 76 mL [95% CI, 34 to 117]; P < .001).
Conclusion Occasional and low cumulative marijuana use was not associated with adverse effects on pulmonary function.
Will This help the UK media think more carefully or look harder about their reporting on cannabis. In “Should I Smoke Dope” Nicki Taylor is told by a Dr that cannabis causes irreparable holes in the lungs. This Dr has been used in several TV cannabis exposés. This kind of misinformation must stop!
GW: Pharmaceutical Cannabis To Go Global In 2012
BRITISH GW Pharmaceuticals are set to make their global footprint in 2012 as they move into Australia, Africa, The Middle East, Asia (not China or Japan) while expanding their business in the areas they have already been able to make an impact in – much of Europe and North America.
Geoffry Guy - GW Pharmaceuticals Executive Chairman
GW Pharmaceuticals this year are starting three Phase IIa trials on patients with diabetes, metabolic diseases and, in the first quarter of 2012, ulcerative colitis.
This means that they are just working with patients to figure out the prescription dose that they will then proceed to give to all the patients in Phase IIb, where they will then determine if the drug has been as effective at this prescribed dose. Phase III trials for cancer pain are currently being recruited for with use of Sativex also. On GWPharm.com Executive Chairman Geoffry Guy says;
“We have embarked on a substantial Phase III programme for Sativex in cancer pain, a major market opportunity…”
This means a larger scale trial and how the drug compares to the current ‘golden standard’ treatment. When GW scientists proclaim that a drug with no side effects or addiction is rarely seen in pharmaceutical drugs you can imagine that these trials will probably pass with flying colours.
The British Government also agree that there is a major market opportunity for Sativex. This is why they were granted a marketing authorization before The National Institute of Heath and Clinical Excellence (NICE) have even approved it or the Home Office have taken advice from its advisory council, the ACMD, on how to reschedule cannabis. This process is underway, cannabis medicine is being delivered to patients – but at a large financial cost to the NHS and to very few patients that it is intended for and who desperately need it. Reporting on GWPharm.com’s financial section;
GW has delivered another robust set of financial results, with substantially increased revenues yielding a profit for the period and a strong cash position. With Sativex now launched in the UK and Spain, an increasing number of additional European approvals and launches for Sativex now expected and the recent agreement with Novartis to commercialise Sativex across a broad region of the world, Sativex should provide GW with a platform for significant growth in the coming years.
Sativex sales were predominantly lifted by its launch in the UK, Germany, Spain and Denmark during 2011 but it has also been approved in Czech Republic, Italy, with Sweden and Austria expected in the coming months.
A post on Proactiveinvestors.co.uk in November 2011 read:
In the twelve months to end September, GW posted a pre-tax profit of £2.5 million, below last year’s £4.6 million profit, but ahead of expectations for 2011.’
Revenues reached £29.6 million, in line with revenues of £30.7 million in 2010, as Sativex sales jumped 59 percent to £4.4 million, while milestone income amounted to £5.3 million compared to £11.2 million a year earlier. The group’s cash position has increased from £25.2 million at the end of 2010 to £28.3 million.
Packaging for an emerging new market? Or swapping our cannabis for your cannabis?
Other names in the Big Pharma family such as Novartis and Bayer are being contracted for distribution rights over the cannabis product and GW have now admitted beyond all doubt that Sativex is cannabis, delivered in doses similar to a mild smoked joint. [I will be releasing a story chaining the evidence together to hopefully make this an indisputable fact. Black and white. Side by side. Sativex is Cannabis and you can make it yourself.]
A cannabis withdrawal drug is about to be trialled in Australia, shockingly that drug is Sativex, so we have the situation where a pharmaceutical company is ready to supply the Big Pharma companies – with world-wide levels of distribution – with cannabis, to replace cannabis. Their cannabis, not our cannabis… GW are a global organization with a legal profit of over £2million (before tax – boo hoo poor them) for growing 300 metric tonnes of cannabis in wet weight (thats 30 metric tonnes dried/smokable/extractable).
Beyond Europe, we look forward to working with Novartis to commercialise Sativex in a number of key emerging markets.
As for a major market opportunity for Sativex in cancer I wonder how the patient would feel when they had their house raided, were arrested, traumatized, treated like a criminal and potentially a terrorist, detained in poor condition (remember this is a cancer patient), forced to defend themselves in silence in front of a Judge biased with Western Patriarchal and Political prejudices and then faces 14 years in prison. Surely growing 300 metric tonnes of cannabis isn’t cause for a medical defence?
Well it is if you are Geoffry Guy…
Stay tuned and subscribed for more top UK Cannabis News and exposure of the GW Pharm monopoly.
UK Cannabis Truth & Awareness Posters
Take it to your Local Head Shop!
Download & Share. Print & Distribute. Educate & Raise Awareness.
There is no need to feel worried or anxious about sharing information – especially when you can do it anonymously! One of the main things that stops people getting involved with real life activism is not knowing where to start – this is it, and it requires very little effort, money or time. Knowing you have made an impact and a difference is the pay back in the short-term but the long-term reward is the achievement when all of this collective work pays off!
Take a picture of them up and send them in to me so I can share them on this page. If you have a campaign poster that is professional and gets the message across please get them sent in so they can be added for other activists to download and share, print and distribute, educate and raise awareness in their home towns, cities and villages up and down the UK.
SEE THEM IN THE REAL WORLD!
@weedistheanswer
UK Cannabis Social Clubs List (UKCSC)
2011 saw an explosion in the UK cannabis movement.
Last Updated: 9 Jan 11
This has been down to refusing to keep the subject a taboo any more. We are here and we are proud of what we are, all with the common love of cannabis for whatever purpose but even more importantly we are here to BRING AN END TO THE UNJUST PROHIBITION OF CANNABIS!
UKCSC (Strain: Cannatonic - Grown in West Midlands)
If you have not yet connected with any of the newly established CSCs (Cannabis Social Clubs) please find the one that you fall into. Currently these are just an online presence but as 2012 unfolds I will be releasing information that will help us progress to the next phase. All things have to start somewhere and this is the fruit of a collaboration of work by people all over the UK. If there is no group already in your area why not Grow Your Own Cannabis Community and plant the seed that could start something to make a change! We are all in this together but no one is going to do it for you.
So, in alphabetical order until there are too many to sift through – here is a list of all currently active UK Cannabis Social Clubs. This will be updated as new groups establish themselves and eventually as they grow and the phases are rolled out an interactive map will be introduced to help people physically see us grow on the map of of our little islands. This is a serious strategy to make a change via presence in the UK, we can only be heard if we make ourselves a presence. By creating a network for activists and enthusiasts people can be helped on all levels, politically, medically and socially – everyone’s message can be spread.
Abingdon & Oxford Cannabis Community
Buckinghamshire Cannabis Collective
Derbyshire Cannabis Collective
Forrest of Dean Cannabis Community
Isle of Wight Cannabis Community
Kent Cannabis Consortium (The)
North Yorkshire Cannabis Community
West Midlands Cannabis Community
West Yorkshire Cannabis Collective
There are 92 counties in the UK so ideally we would like to see at least one for each of them (no duplicates please) but already we have “East Surrey” and “West Yorkshire” to show that bigger counties will find more support in localizing the group slightly more. It will also help when future phases roll out and we bring this into the real world.
Thank you for the tremendous support in making this community and movement happen! You are the movement and you are the community, keep it fresh and keep it up to date – your freedom and happiness relies on your motivation!
Please promote YOUR LOCAL cannabis news stories, we must look at what is happening in our area. Please see the posters page for photos to add to your page for people to share and share the link to the page too. Find the Cannabis Support Network UK and if you need help or have anything to offer PLEASE do not hesitate to leave a message on the page, we are providing an open network for everyone in the cannabis community. Safety in numbers.
Cannabis Truth: Save & Share. Print & Distribute. Raise Awareness.
Grow Your Own Cannabis Community!
Get connected. Get collective.
The truth is out there now, and it is ever increasing in its social presence. It is down to us to make it even more widespread. Raising more awareness is where the cannabis community needs to start focusing their efforts. Who do we need to make more aware? Everyone! You may be involved with some level of activism already or you may not even realise that there is a community. For those of you that are reading this who consider themselves ‘awake’ to the cannabis situation I’d like you to think back to that moment when you realised…there’s more to this than just smoking weed. People claim that it was reading “The Emperor Wears No Clothes” by Jack Herer that opened their eyes, or watching The Union: The Business Behind Getting High a documentary that took a good look at behind the scenes of the illegal cannabis trade in Canada and the USA. It may have been as simple as seeing a comment on a Facebook story about the injustice behind cannabis arrests or seeing a story about the medicinal benefits of cannabis making life better for someone with a certain illness. There is no need to be ashamed of being a cannabis user or supporter so lets give people the chance to show their green side and pave the way forward to changing the stigma of cannabis users to a more neutral one.
This is a basic guide for those of you out there that want to step up their game and do their part for the cause, and, if you insert a little bit of joy, passion, and initiative into it, you will be able to start something new that could, and I hope will, last long into the future and play a significant role in changing the laws that punish normal people for at the most basic level just possessing a tiny amount of plant matter. The aim of these groups is to make a network in the UK whereby we can strengthen our movement politically, actively, and socially taking into consideration the public that we are trying to convince not to see us as monsters. When we build this net if we fall again it will not be so hard a landing and easier to find our way back to the stash again.
Before you jump the bong and make a duplicate group check the list of already running groups here.
1) Establish your cannabis group. 
- Come up with a name. This has got to sound good when you say it, read nicely, and shouldn’t be too wordy. It also has to say what it is for example Sussex Cannabis Collective, London Cannabis Club, Wales Social Cannabis Club or Berkshire Cannabis Community; all groups which have been established in the later part of 2011 that look set and steady on growing through 2012 and into the greener clearer future. Let us not forget Kent Cannabis Consortium holding it up over on the east coast!
- Create a Facebook page as a group or organisation titled with your new group name. I am sure by now you are all well aware of the advantages of Facebook’s sharing and liking facilities so put them to good use and keep track of the figures as they grow.
- Start a Twitter account. There is a huge cannabis community on the short status social network that has been a great asset in sharing news stories and updates quick with a really large number of people that can help share your stories and tweets more by Retweeting your tweets. Posting pictures of local buds is a good way to get interactive with people and you can use the # key at the front of a word like #weed (known as a hashtag) and anyone following the word #weed will see your tweet in their feed. Probably one of the easiest networks to use, requires very little effort and can yield a great response if you give it the little effort it requires.
- Get a logo. Image is very important in this day and age. If your logo is shoddy or a doesn’t represent what it is meant to be representing (a local cannabis club) then it isn’t going to be effective in making people want to look a bit further if they see it. This is not to say that it has to be complicated. Most of the groups that have set themselves up are going about by using their coat of arms (if applicable) and then adding a cannabis leaf and the text with the name of the group. Something simple is usually quite effective, especially when social media sites make avatars so small. If you aren’t handy on a graphics program there are lots of people that are and would be able to knock something up reasonably fast.
2) Set out your aims/identity.
People are going to want to know something about your group so it’s probably going to be a good idea if you put together a little paragraph or two to let people know what your aims are.
- To create a network and community. This already exists and it is just a case of bringing people together so they know they belong. This shows us we are here and outsiders that we are here and we don’t think anything is wrong with what we do or love.
- To make people more aware about cannabis and more importantly the TRUTH about cannabis and the TRUTH about prohibition.
- To be an interactive body that can raise and gain an awareness of the cannabis events in the area. This includes political stories, police raids that have been taking place, reports of contaminated weed around or anything that cannabis consumers should be made known about. When we have no regulation it is important we provide as much help to our fellow herbalists as possible.
3) Making it bigger.
The idea behind this is to grow, to see the numbers or shares and likes go up through the tens, the hundreds, the thousands and then into the multiples and beyond. This is how we know we are reaching more people and it really is quite simple and self serving once you have got a bit of the ground work laid down.
- Don’t continue to do this on your own as it starts to take off. It could become a drag if you feel like you are the only one to be doing anything. The best way to sort this out is to keep your eye out for people that say they want to help or upgrade someone’s page abilities that have been posting frequently or post good stories. Even that little bit of a confidence boost could spur them on more and make the whole thing step up a notch!
- Post the latest news stories about cannabis in your area. This is easy all you have to do is set up alerts on the news tab in Google search and when the stories come through you can post them on your page. Local newpapers, national newspapers, radio and anything else is good content and the more of it relevant to your group’s area the better. This is all about localizing the movement.
- Find out about your MP’s cannabis opinion and political stance (often they will conflict) and keep your members up to date with any correspondences you have with them. Knowing your enemy is good but not knowing that you might have an ally is much worse.
- Build a rapport with your fan-base and community. Ask them questions in your status’ about the strains they smoke on, ask what the price is in their particular locality or what their stories about local police interactions are. Be creative but make your page a fun place for people to be bothered about coming back to.
4) Generate new media. Content is important.
Eventually you should get to the point where things are starting to circulate. There is only going to be so much content that we can share though and if we want to get people in the know we can’t simply rely on commenting on mainstream media stories. Not everyone is into Facebook or Twitter, or can put that they like cannabis on their page because of work and the unjust stigma we are trying to change. But they might like to read news stories about cannabis every now and then. If you can be the source that they get their news stories from, you are providing the resource for positive change, not only in your area but for the country.
- Start a blog for your group. There are lots of blogging sites so if you can’t get on with one you will be sure to get on with another. This blog is written in WordPress and the Clear UK website is also based on that platform which makes it a good choice because you can like and follow other blogs which will help strengthen our community more and possibly reach into a new audience on WordPress.
- Once a week is not much to have to do and it can be a basic post just linking all or some of the cannabis news stories that have been published with a comment about each under the link or a comment about the overall week. Not only does this serve to get information out to a wider audience but it creates a record and archive for us to be able to see where we have progressed from.
- There are plenty more ways to generate media. Strain reviews from community members might make it interactive if you can let them submit things too. A YouTube account has been a very effective way at getting the word out, especially about personal opinions or just uploading a clip you saw on Police, Camera, Action from your town.
5) Real world interaction.
So we have managed to establish our new cannabis social group on the internet and we are pleased that the likes, shares and comments are coming in. All the while we are reaching an online audience with success, the tokers in your town that don’t care about the internet are being ignored. We need to reach out to them as well, so maybe getting out of your house/comfort zone every now and again if you are able to and putting up posters/flyers and writing to your local papers would go some way to aid this part of the campaign.
- Putting up posters and handing out flyers. Pick your places – is there a University in your town or city? There might be multiple ones. Clubbing together with a couple of members to get some printed up and meeting to hand out flyers at the campus can go a long way. It can also act as a good team building event and you never know what handy person you might bump into while you are on your activism mission.
- Put up a notice in your local shops if you feel cheeky enough. The local community board at your village hall might have the open space to post something up. If you face hurdles or denials use them as an excuse to draw attention to the situation. Write to your councilor and tell them you think it is unfair that you cannot put a flyer up on a community board about a community group in your local community. Basics, and it doesn’t have to go into depth.
- Organize a local meeting. If you are feeling brave and up to it, and you feel like you have enough support in the area you are trying to represent or make a representation for, get together with a group and organize an event at a town or village hall/meeting place. Church hall space? What is wrong with appealing to local groups in our outer community that should be supporting the end of prohibition? Surely the Church cannot support Vietnamese gangs’ human trafficking and child slavery in their town so we should get them to get behind us. The Sheffield Quakers for example have said they support the cause.
- Bring the Cannabis Truth Road Show to your town!
Sanj Chowdhary, head of the MP’s campaign at Clear – Cannabis Law Reform has written up this fantastic blog on the Clear site to tell you more ways that you can become active in the real world and within your immediate local community. If people can start implementing the democratic processes we have in the UK we might have a speedier chance of getting things changed for all of us for the better than if we are just talking about it too!
Despite these things seeming like a big challenge when you break them down, take them easy, and realise the bigger picture that we do (unfortunately) have time to grow this movement before prohibition ends (and it is only going to end when we grow this movement) it can be done, and with little stress or time stolen away from your usual Facebook refreshing habits. It might not be you that is ready or able to do this task but you might know the person that does want to, or feels that they are ready – well, you might just even know someone that you think is up for the task and has the skills it needs to be done successfully. Share this guide and see if we can start something, it would be good to see a network rise up in 2012 that will help pave the way for the future and the campaigns that we plan on implementing in the near future.
Coventry Judge Demands “Quit Cannabis Or Year In Prison”
A Cannabis user in Coventry has just been told to quit his 10-year cannabis habit by a Judge after he was found cultivating and supplying cannabis from his home during a February raid.
Stuart Campbell originally claimed that the cannabis was for his own personal use but when the case came to court he pleaded guilty to possession of cannabis with intent to supply and production of cannabis. At his home when the warrant was executed, 30 cannabis seedlings were found along with £1,000 worth of “cannabis leaf” and £2,200 in cash. Hardly someone high up the ladder in a drugs network, it is quite clear that this was an independent operation.
The sentence passed down by Judge Trevor Faber was a 12-month sentence suspended for two years while also having to complete an 18-month supervision order and a “thinking skills course”. Judge Faber added: ‘‘It appears to me that you have been using cannabis habitually since the early 90s and nothing has persuaded you to stop it. You will stop it now.” Maybe Stuart Campbell never stopped because it never caused any detriment to his health and because there were no victims to the so called crime that he has been charged with.
It is easier to accept that the courts ask Mr Campbell to stop dealing cannabis but not to ask him to stop using it, which is technically not against the law. The Misuse of Drugs Act states that it is an offence (not sure who to or how) to posses, distribute or cultivate cannabis; this is nothing more than a moral imposition. The legal and political system does not like cannabis us; it is illegal not because it is causing crime or harm to anyone. No victim has been reported in this case. No license exists for this grow but that is hardly surprising seeing as it costs pounds to grow 30 plants and it costs over £17,000 to apply to the Government to cultivate cannabis who deny you what should be, and is in reality, your natural human right to do if you so wish.
The police are wasting a huge amount of money enforcing prohibition of cannabis and the cultivation of it. The courts are complaining that regularly more than 50% of the cases each day are for cannabis cultivation or for those caught dealing on the streets. This says very strongly that there is a strong demand for cannabis and no matter how much money they want to throw at it, the production of it – which is as easy as planting a seed – isn’t going to disappear. The only way to have more control over the situation than they do now is to regulate the market. Allow people to grow it and give people who don’t want or know how to grow it the ability and respect to go into a regulated, dedicated store and purchase it.
The regulation of alcohol allows people to buy it in pretty much any store that sells food and drink now, not only in packs but in single cans or bottles. If you like you can also brew your own beer at home and take the time to get so good at it that you enter it into beer festivals. All without being criminalised. If Mr Campbell brewed beer and sold it in a pub or bar he would be an ordinary member of society. Because he chooses to do the same thing with a plant that kills 14,500 less people a year than the legal and morally acceptable alcohol he is a not only a criminal, he has been put in a personal moral situation that he will be lawfully effected by.
Side note: Hmmm, so this guy was dealing a bit on the side to keep himself afloat and now he has a criminal record and a scary drugs conviction – do our leaders and social task force believe that they have just made the situation any better? For him I would say “good luck trying to get a job acceptable to them now” and for them I would say “well done for meeting your targets again, lads”.
Community Intellegence Leads Police To Bust £8 Million A Year Cannabis Farm In Merseyside’s Biggest Find.
In a disused Merseyside factory, police have just carried out their largest ever cannabis raid it, was reported in The Liverpool Echo on Friday. Those behind the highly professional set up have not been established by the police yet and an investigation has been launched to find them. From the photos released by The Echo it is clear to see that the level of sophistication is no more than a dressed down version than that of the legal warehouse grows of GW Pharmaceuticals, who can grow 20 tonnes per annum to produce Sativex for a limited number of MS patients in the UK, Canada and a dozen other countries across the world.
Are the police chasing a dangerous drug or is this a licensing issue?
The Misuse of Drugs Act ’71 says that cannabis is a dangerous drug that has no medicinal benefits and that is the statement that the Government like to feed the media in any correspondence that they are forced to give. So why are GW Pharmaceutical’s able to grow the same plant whose seed stock came from the same as 90% of the people growing it illegally in Europe and most of America – Hortifarm, a company whose license and the way that it was obtained is in much dispute.
Officers were clearly taken back and impressed by the quality of the grow, “Some of the plants are so tall you could easily get lost for a while in there,” shows you that this is not your regular cannabis “factory” as the tabloids like to report it.
Police Superintendent White in his statement said that it was down to “community intelligence” that the grow was found in Bootle, the largest they have ever come across. Supt White added: “The community are our eyes and ears. They know where this type of activity is taking place.” Certainly the way that the media are set in their ways at keeping the general public dumbed down from the truth about cannabis and maintaining an agenda of demonization to keep their negative stigma afloat, goes so far as aiding the police gain the support they need to match the targets they are probably given so they continue to receive a larger budget. The drug war IS a false economy and it is turning into an entertainment one at that.
Last week Operation Audatious was launched in Manchester where 1000 police officers went out to raid residential and business properties, warehouses and disused premises under a warrant allowing them under the Misuse of Drugs Act again. 130 members from different sectors of the public were selected and invited out on these raids to witness how these kinds of anti drugs raids take place. The media attention that it gathered was ample enough to send out the intended scare warning that ‘this society does not accept (these kinds of) drugs’ yet all the while the pages inbetween are Heineken ads and alcohol culture is at its peak. I bring this point up just to lay example to what I wrote earlier about the MDA71; it creates the situation where the police are involved and take heavy handed action over an agricultural practice for “health reasons” at the same time as a global corporate pharmaceutical company can mass produce it and export it to over a dozen countries in every continent, and at the same time as 14,500 are dying a year from alcohol use (not abuse according to NHS figures for 2005) compared to only 750 cases that were admitted to hospital for cannabis use.
England didn’t know what a cannabis farm war ten years ago, now we are referring to them as a problem just because there is so many of them being stumbled across… just imagine the ones that are going unnoticed and unfound, able to produce four multi-million pound harvests a year – year after year. Not only is the Government not taxing this income that Denver in Colorado have spent the last decade working on regulations for under their Medical Marijuana bill Amendment 20, but they are spending in excess of £16 billion a year trying to eradicate the cultivation and use of the cannabis plant. Cultural cleansing? This is without a doubt today’s civil rights movement and the financial figures calculated by the Independent Drug Monitoring Unit released in September this year back that up.
In A Clear Plan For Regulating Cannabis In Britain we can see that at the lower end of the estimate we would see £6.7 billion per annum generated by tax and on the higher end we can see figures reaching over £12 billion per annum. When you couple up these figures with the money that we are effectively seeing go to waste on enforcing cannabis prohibition in Britain, the Exchequer could be announcing at a future budget how due to a combination of saving and generating tax from legitimising the cannabis market, creating a new industry, there is now a further £40 billion + to spread out across other public sectors including public health care in the NHS, pensions, school programs, the housing crisis, fixing roads and improving Britain in general.
Not to mention… imagine how much time the police would have if they didn’t have to spend days, weeks, months and years investigating cannabis networks. Not everyone that grows cannabis is a criminal and involved in the violent gangs that just use cannabis to make up the money to carry out much more heinous crimes like human trafficking. Many are growing cannabis because they want to be able to do it in a legal industry and they are good at growing cannabis, are we not encouraged from a young age to do the things in life we love.
“The warehouse is not being used for any legitimate business it seems,” says Supt White of Merseyside police who revealed that it had taken longer than they usually take when carrying out a raid on a property for these reasons. This does not look like your standard Vietnames set up, everything is very clean, tidy and laid out in a manor much in the same way as the legal medical marijuana grows in America under regulation of the state, decor finesse is the only thing stopping this grow op from being in the running for a spread in High Times.
It’s time we let our politicians and local councillors know that there is a better way to control this situation – cannabis use is not going away and we need to stop pretending that prohibition is the answer. 50 years of throwing money and police officers at it has not got us anywhere but deeper into the realisation of how deep this culture is. It is time to look at methods of regulation.
All we have to look forward to now that this bust has taken place is room for another group to move in and make bigger profits in the gap that has been created, and more police time wasted hunting for the farmers and brains behind the set up. Lots of money goes down the drain in this process, real criminals get to continue getting away with real crime that has real victims unlike cannabis use, or cultivation, and the police continue to gain a bad reputation from the millions of cannabis consumers in the UK.
Public Freedom Of Information Inquiry Denied By Home Office For “Public Interest” Reasons
Clear – Cannabis Law Reform – are on a mission to make the truth about cannabis clear. To aid this task party leader, Peter Reynolds, submitted a Freedom of Information request on behalf of the British public to have published the licenses granted to GW Pharmaceuticals who have the unique lawful ability to grow cannabis for production of their MS treatment Sativex.
This information will allow us to see how we can help stop thousands of cannabis consumers being criminalized, and help hundreds of thousands, if not millions, who need to use cannabis in amounts that require them to grow it and gain the legal right to be able to do so. Between 2 and 6 million people in the UK consume cannabis on a regular basis and £16 billion a year is put on the tax payer enforcing prohibition of the scientifically proven non-toxic plant.
Reynolds original request reads;
Dear Home Office,
Under the Misuse of Drugs Act 1971, the Home Secretary is able to
issue licences covering production, possession and supply of any
controlled drug. GW Pharmaceuticals has been granted such licences
in relation to cannabis. I hereby request that a copy of all said
licences relating to GW Pharmaceuticals and cannabis, and all
secondary requirements such as fees, terms and conditions etc., be
provided.”
The reply to the request was not the desired one but has given those following the movement in the UK the feeling that there is something being covered up other than the reasons given by Mr Lee Smith of the Drugs Licensing and Compliance Unit. The most telling part of the reply;
I can confirm that the Home Office holds the information that you requested.
However, after careful consideration we have decided that the information is
exempt from disclosure under sections 30 (1)(a), 41 and 43 of the Freedom of
Information Act. These provide that information can be withheld where
disclosure would be an actionable breach of confidence or would be likely to,
prejudice the prevention or detection of crime and the commercial interests of
any person, and the public interest falls in favour of applying these
exemptions.
In the official Clear reply – swiftly submitted – it points out the two main points of denial for the FOI request and then attacks them;
1. It may damage GW Pharma’s commercial interests.
This is an absurd excuse. GW has already been granted what is
almost certainly an unlawful monopoly. The relationship between the
Home Office and GW is self-evidently corrupt and improper. How does
this square with the anti-monopoly provisions of the Enterprise Act
2002? What opportunities exist for other businesses to grow
cannabis for medicine? This licence is issued by a public authority
and its terms and conditions (redacted in part if necessary) should
be freely available to public scrutiny.
We already know that pharmaceutical companies in both the UK and the US are trying to find a way to patent cannabis or cannabinoids; this is most likely going to happen in a way that patents cannabinoid combinations. So far this has been impossible to accomplish because cannabis and natural cannabinoids known as phytocannabinoids aren’t patentable, they grow naturally and that goes outside the rules. This has encouraged the US to bend the rules a little and soon we will see mass production from another pharma company out there legally distributing cannabis medicine to patients that if they were to grow their own would face federal imprisonment.
In the UK we have a situation where GW Pharmaceuticals have the monopoly on cannabis medicine creating a situation where they are able to completely control the market and the cost of the product – so much to the point that local health authorities are denying it from the Multiple Sclerosis patients that it is intended to be prescribed to. The cost of Sativex is around 1000 times greater than the cost to actually produce herbal cannabis which, according to medical users who have tried the spray, exceeds the spray in effects. If GW were able to be challenged in the market of providing cannabis medicines that can now be scientifically and categorically proven to provide a better quality of life and reduce the symptoms for a whole host of illnesses and disorders to patients, the chances are the price is going to have to come down. That’s just how the market works.
The denial to allow the public to see this information on the grounds that GW’s commercial interests would be damaged just means that it might allow others to use relevant information to start their own business and make money with cannabis legally for medical purposes, just like GW – and that would take away from their profits. What other industry has this kind of protection? Remember they can’t patent cannabis yet…
2. It may make GW potential targets of criminal activity.Again, an absurd excuse. The location of GW’s facilities are
already public knowledge – at its headquarters in Porton Down,
Wiltshire and at the Kent Science Park, Sittingbourne,.This is nothing but an excuse to prevent public scrutiny and
amounts to an unlawful breach of the FOI Act 2000.
As the reply states, the location of GW is already known and it doesn’t take long to search on the internet to get a result. If there was that much of a concern about the secrecy of GW’s growing facilities would they really have showed it in all of its glory on the BBC Horizon episode The Evil Weed? Maybe we should be submitting a Freedom of Information request to find out how many times the UK’s only legal cannabis farm has been attacked or attempted to be broken into?
Or would it inspire anger in the public that are thrust into the realms of criminality if they try to carry out the same practices. Is cannabis dangerous, or are their concerns about licensing and the financial loss to GW Pharmaceuticals that would follow if ordinary members of the public were able to obtain growing licenses? As the first response from the original request states, the information which shows you the fees for the licensing of producing THC cannabis in the UK are available on the Home office Website:
New application for a licence to:
- possess controlled drugs = £3,133
- supply, or offer to supply, controlled drugs = £3,655
- produce preparations containing controlled drugs = £4,178
- produce controlled drugs = £4,700
- cultivate cannabis= £4,700
- cultivate cannabis with a THC content not exceeding 0.2 per cent = £580
So if you want to grow your own cannabis for your own personal use it is going to cost you £17,291 just for the paperwork cost and then every year you would have to pay a renewal of between £300 and £11,400 depending on the status of inspection for the license but, seeing as we can’t get access to the only one that exists in the country, that information remains a mystery. £17k isn’t something your normal, regular, everyday person who just wants to use cannabis can afford, let alone people who are desperate to grow their own to treat their serious medical needs or for someone to grow it for them. A basic grow set up starts around £500 with some people spending £10,000 on a up to date with the latest technology indoor garden, just as GW have been able to do so. In Colorado and other such states that have regulated medicinal cannabis use for qualifying conditions patients only have to pay around $200 for be legally posess and grow canabis with a plant limit and usable amount of medicine in weight as a requirement. It is so important to the state it has created 8000 jobs, 125,000 patients and has been written into the states constitution meaning the state will intervene with any federal action that is taken against Colorado Medical Marijuana Clinics.
Why should someone have to pay such a large amount in bureaucratic fees for something which they are not going to be supplying, distributing or making any money back on…AND of which a year’s supply would not even cost as much to produce as the licensing fees imposed?
So, as a conclusion, when the Drugs Licensing and Compliance Unit say that it is in “the public interest” to keep this information in the shadows, what they really mean is that it is in GW Pharma’s interest to keep this information redacted in its entirety so that they can continue to charge prices higher than the black market to patients sicker than the kind of people the government are trying to protect from using it – everyone else.
To follow this Freedom of Information request bookmark this page.
For more information about the political campaign in the UK visit http//clear-uk.org.
cannabiscureuk 