Medical Cannabis and Cancer

The science behind the cure

by Herb Growell 

THC in Cannabis oil killing cancer cells, while leaving healthy cells alone
(https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=az-_uV1-xwI)

If you’re at all informed on health matters, it’s depressingly clear that cancer is a bad disease to ‘catch’. It often ends in death or mutilation, and virtually everything we do, consume, or even think about can cause it. From drinking beer to eating bacon, many or our favorite meals are becoming examples of living dangerously. As our environment become more toxic, the places we live and even visit can harm us. Don’t forget about that cell phone that’s glued to the side of your head either, let’s just say that the jury’s still out on that one but it’s not looking good. 

While cancer is the second leading cause of death in America, the 411 isn’t all bad. Just as there are many causes, there are many ways to prevent or reverse cancer. But the news can be bewildering. Just recently I’ve read that new research shows: calcium supplements could cause cancer, eating broccoli with mustard prevents cancer, human skin bacteria has “cancer-fighting powers”, pawpaw fruit prevents colon cancer, and that coffee is a cancer preventative. 

Due to this confusion it seems the best advice for a cancer patient is to stay informed, so you aren’t constantly chasing your tail by acting on the latest headline. Because if you believe them, cancer is a simple proposition that can be reversed by making a single change to your personal routine or environment. The truth is that most cancers are complex in nature, and are caused by a combination of genetic and environmental factors. It’s hardly ever caused by a single one. 

According to the American Cancer Society, there are more than 300 activities and substances that could cause cancer, and nearly the same number that could prevent it. It’s patently impossible to keep track, especially when much of their advice seems contradictory. We do know that 30% of all cancers are currently attributed to known and avoidable risk factors.

We’ve known for decades that Cannabis can play an important role in oncology. Let’s start with the official line. According to the National Cancer Institute, the potential benefits of Medical Cannabis for people living with cancer include: nausea prevention, appetite stimulation, pain relief, and improved sleep. Physicians in the United States who recommend Medical Cannabis for their cancer patients do so predominantly from a symptom management perspective. It’s also very important to provide relief for the traditional treatments for cancer, as many of these can be quite debilitating to the patient. Chemotherapy in particular has a horrible bevy of side-effects, to go along with its anemic rate of success, and radiation isn’t much better.  

These states and territories have legalized Cannabis for medical purposes. States that have legalized 
only one cannabinoid, such as cannabidiol (CBD), are not included in the map.

Medical Cannabis has been long-known to counteract chemotherapy’s negative affect on the patient’s appetite, and it also helps with the nausea. Good nutrition is very important to cancer patients, to maintain the stamina their immune system needs to keep fighting their cancer.

What we’re (re-)learning now is that Medical Cannabis’ potential is for much more than just the management of cancer’s symptoms. The U.S. Government has known about the effectiveness of Cannabis against certain types of cancer since 1974. While the study itself went down the War on Drug’s memory hole, an article about that study published by the Washington Post survived. Written by Victor Cohn, the story was entitled, “Cancer Curb Is Studied: Doctors Eye Drug Found In Marijuana”. Cohn reported that “the active chemical agent in marijuana curbs the growth of three kinds of cancer (lung, breast, and viral-induced leukemia) in mice”.

The exciting news these days is that research into the ability of Cannabis to actually cure and prevent cancer, rather that just treating its symptoms, is finally starting to explode. Because Cannabis is still on Schedule I of the U.S. Controlled Substance Act, meaning it has “no medicinal value”, almost all of this research is being conducted in other countries. But that hasn’t stopped U.S. Citizens and alternative caregivers from pursuing these treatments, and many states have legalized Medical and even recreational Cannabis in support.

Let’s get into what everyone’s getting so worked up about. While we have long known about the potential for Medical Cannabis to treat cancer, it’s exciting to see the research being formalized, and people getting starting to be saved in larger and larger numbers. What is it about Cannabis that makes it so effective in tackling such a wide variety of diseases? In a word it’s about cannabinoids, and how they interact with our bodies’ endocannabinoid receptors.

In recent decades, the neurobiology of cannabinoids have been analyzed. The first cannabinoid receptor we discovered, CB1, was identified in the human brain in 1988. A second cannabinoid receptor, CB2, was identified in 1993. The highest expression of CB2 receptors is located on B lymphocytes and natural killer cells, suggesting a role in our immune system. Endocannabinoids have been identified and appear to play a significant role in pain modulation, movement control, feeding behavior, mood, bone growth, inflammation, neuroprotection, and memory.

Endocannabinoids are cannabinoids that our body manufactures, and exocannabinoids come from an external source. The exogenous cannabinoids produced by cannabis are also known as “phytocannabinoids,” where the prefix “phyto” comes from the Greek word for “plant.”

But what are cannabinoids? In a nutshell they are a group of unique molecular compounds, that are found in varying ratios in species of Cannabis plants. The main psychoactive constituent of Cannabis is delta-9-tetrahydrocannabinol (THC). In 1986 an isomer of synthetic delta-9-THC was licensed and approved, for the treatment of chemotherapy-associated nausea and vomiting under the generic name dronabinol. Another important cannabinoid found in Cannabis is CBD, a non-psychoactive cannabinoid that is an analog of THC, meaning that it typically limits the psychoactive affects of THC. A product called nabiximols (Sativex), a Cannabis extract with a 1:1 ratio of THC:CBD, was approved in Canada for symptomatic relief of pain from advanced cancer and multiple sclerosis, as existing therapy has been historically unsatisfactory.

To understand how cannabinoids kill cancer, we will first look at what keeps cancel cells alive, then come back to how CBD and THC can undo their life-support system.

In every cell in our body, there is a unique combination of factors that either mean imminent death for that cell, or extends that cell’s vitality and life. If one of these factors, called cerimide, is high, cell death is imminent. If ceramide is low, the cell is strong in its vitality. Very simply, when THC connects to CB1 or CB2 cannabinoid receptor sites on a cancer cell, it causes an increase in ceramide synthesis which drives cell death. A healthy cell conveniently doesn’t produce ceramide in the presence of THC, thus is not affected by the cannabinoid.

Within cytoplasm of most cells, there is a nucleus, mitochondria, and various other organelles. The purpose of the mitochondria is to produce energy, in the form of the coenzyme ATP, for the cell to use to sustain itself. As ceramide starts to accumulate, turning up a mechanism called the Sphingolipid Rheostat, it increases the mitochondrial membrane pore permeability to Cytochrome C, a critical protein in energy synthesis. This means that Cytochrome C is now pushed out of the mitochondria, killing the source of energy for the cancer cell.

The key to this process is the accumulation of ceramide in the system. Ceramide also causes genotoxic stress in the cancer cell nucleus by generating a protein called p53, whose job it is to disrupt calcium metabolism in the mitochondria. As if this weren’t enough, ceramide also disrupts the cell’s digestive system, which provides nutrients for its functions. This means that ceramide actively inhibits pro-survival pathways, leaving no possibility for the cell’s survival.

Why is it that the body can take a simple plant enzyme and use it for profound healing, in many different physiological systems? This endocannabinoid system exists in all animal life, just waiting for its matched exocannabinoid activator. Our human endocannabinoid system is the messenger of information flowing between our immune system and our central nervous system (CNS). It is responsible for neuroprotection, and micro-manages our entire immune system. This is the primary control system that maintains homeostasis, or our bodies’ well being. 

Endocannabinoids have their origin in nerve cells right at the synapse. When the body is compromised through illness or injury it calls insistently to the endocannabinoid system and directs the immune system to bring healing. If these homeostatic systems are weakened, we have found that exocannabinoids are therapeutic, in the most natural way possible.

"research into the ability of Medical Cannabis to prevent and cure cancer, 

rather that just treating its symptoms, is finally starting to explode"

We can visualize the cannabinoid as a three dimensional molecule, where one part of the molecule is configured to fit the cell receptor site like a key in a lock. We have at least two types of cannabinoid receptor sites, CB1 (CNS) and CB2 (immune). In general CB1 activates the CNS messaging system, and CB2 activates the immune system, but it’s much more complex than this. Among strains of Cannabis, Sativa tends toward the CB1 receptor, and Indica tends toward CB2. So sativa is more neuroactive, and indica is more immunoactive. Another factor here is that sativa is dominated by THC cannabinoids, and indica is predominately CBD (cannabidiol).

The human body can use both THC and CBD interchangeably. When stress, injury, or illness demand more symptomatic relief than can be produced by the body, its mimetic exocannabinoids are activated. If the stress is transitory, then the treatment can be transitory. If the demand is sustained, such as with cancer, then treatment needs to provide sustained pressure to counteract that demand. This means that the cancer patient needs to be invested in taking therapeutic amounts of CBD and THC steadily, over a period of time, in order to keep metabolic pressure on the cancer cell’s ability to sustain itself, which results in its death. 

A little more detail: CBD typically gravitates to the densely packed CB2 receptors in the spleen, which is home to the body’s immune system. From there, immune cells seek out and destroy cancer cells. In addition, it has been shown that THC and CBD cannabinoids have the ability to kill cancer cells directly without going through these immune intermediaries. To do this THC and CBD hijack something called the lipoxygenase pathway, to directly inhibit tumor growth. 

An interesting side note: It’s been discovered that CBD can even help the body preserve its own natural endocannabinoid, by inhibiting the enzyme that breaks down anandamide (AEA). AEA is known as the human version of THC, and has been dubbed the “bliss molecule” by William Devane. Devane discovered it while working with Raphael Mechoulam, the man who, along with his research team, discovered THC. Anandamide’s word root, Ananda, is Sanskrit for bliss :)

It’s literally impossible to cover all of the latest research concerning Medical Cannabis as a real solution for cancer in one article. But I am hoping to leave you with an appreciation for the fact that nature has designed for us a perfect medicine, that fits exactly with our immune system. 

Medical Cannabis helps us to provide for rapid and complete immune response, systemic integrity, and metabolic homeostasis. While we’re just starting to scratch the surface of all this knowledge, many people are already putting it to work toward saving their own lives.

Special bonus for our online readers:

A link to 34 medical studies, all confirming Cannabis can cure cancer!

(http://realfarmacy.com/34-medical-studies-for-the-skeptic/)

Irie for Life,
Herb is a long-time Cannabis enthusiast, advocate, evangelist and self-medicating 
patient, helping to spread light wherever there is darkness.
If you seek more information like supporting videos and web links to background sources for the 
above information please visit us online, or Herb at upliftingvapor.blogspot.com