Medsafe investigating claims on cannabis billboard

Medsafe is "looking into" what is being called New Zealand's first medical cannabis advertising campaign.

Since a billboard advertising cannabis as medicine was erected on Auckland's Anzac Ave earlier this week, the Advertising Standards Authority has received multiple complaints.

Helius Therapeutics, a licensed medicinal cannabis company, launched the billboards following last week's legalization of medicinal cannabis manufacture, to "rebrand" cannabis.

A spokesman for Medsafe, the regulator for medicines and medical devices,​ said it was not correct to say that all cannabis is medicine. "Sativex is the only cannabinoid product approved by Medsafe in New Zealand...Medsafe is aware of this campaign and is looking into it."

Here at MindFuel we strongly disagree with this attitude. Anyone who has studied the history of medicine knows already that Cannabis is one of the earliest medicines to have been utilized by humans and also one of the most effective medicines we have ever discovered. Medsafe could save themselves billions by reading the history books rather than always thinking they always need to re-invent the wheel.  The research as to whether Cannabis is a medicine has already been done - Just read Marijuana Medicine by Christian Ratsch.

Besides, if its wasn't for Cannabis's pesky MODA scheduling, Cannabis would be classed as a herbal remedy (a traditional medicine) as all traditional herbal medicines are by default.

Medicines are technically synthetic copies of plant constituents. But that does not mean that the plants they ripped off are not also medicines. In most cases tribes have already been using these plants as medicines for thousands of years. Besides most of the time the plants are better medicines anyway due to all the minor constituents found alongside the main medicinal compounds. This is why natural Cannabis is so much a better medicine than that crap Sativex they are pushing. Sativex is just THC and CBD. But Cannabis is much more than THC and CBD. Its all about the terpenes, flavinoids, cannabinoids and other minor constituents found in natural cannabis and how they interact with each other as well as with THC and CBD. Like Salt and Pepper on a nice meal, without these other compounds THC, CBD and Sativex are bland.

We wish Helius Therapeutics all the best with their campaign.

Source: Stuff.co.nz

*Special thanks to TVNZ for the cool pic^