Dad cures son's brain cancer illegally...

[Kaneman]

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/health/ar...na-father.html

4th May 2011

A desperate father whose son was suffering from a life-threatening brain tumour has revealed he gave him cannabis oil to ease his pain. And he has now apparently made a full recovery.

Cash Hyde, known as Cashy, was a perfectly healthy baby when he was born in June 2008 but became sick shortly before his second birthday.

At first he was misdiagnosed with glandular fever before his parents Mike and Kalli, from Missoula in Montana, were given the devastating news he had a serious brain tumour.

The little boy had to have arduous chemotherapy treatment to reduce the growth, which had drastic side effects including seizures and a blood infection.

His distraught parents were repeatedly told he was likely to succumb to the illness because the condition was so bad.

After one bout of high-dose chemotherapy, Cash was so weak he could not lift his head and was too sick to eat any solid food for 40 days.

It was at this point that Mr Hyde decided to take action and go down the route of medical marijuana to try to help his young son.

Cash's doctors refused to even discuss the option but his father went and sought authorization elsewhere and then secretly administered it through his son's feeding tube.

He also told doctors to stop giving Cash the cocktail of anti-nausea drugs he had been taking - although he never told them what he was doing.

Mr Hyde told KXLY News that his son started looking better right away.

Mr Hyde said: 'He hadn't eaten a thing in 40 days - and, it was really incredible to watch him take a bite of a piece of cheese. It shows that he wants to live'.

He credits the cannabis oil with helping his son get through the chemo, and say Cash has now been declared cancer free by doctors.

The boy is now back and home and living the life of a typical young boy, playing with his elder brother Colty.

Medical marijuana is legal in some states, including Montana, but its use for children is poorly understood and quite rate.

The US federal government does not recognize the legality of using the drug for medical reasons and frequently clashes with states over the issue.

Mr Hyde told KXLY: 'It's very controversial, it's very scary. But, there's nothing more scary than losing your child.'

[Particle Man]

I hope they don't screw with the guy over it. I'd do anything to keep my kid healthy as well.

[shmike]

Chemo isn't illegal.


It does suck that in a state where medicinal MJ is legal, he still had to resort to the black market to obtain it.

[Particle Man]

Originally Posted by shmike

Chemo isn't illegal.

True but the M probably made the full regimine of chemo possible for the kid to get through.

[Kaneman]

Originally Posted by shmike

Chemo isn't illegal.


It does suck that in a state where medicinal MJ is legal, he still had to resort to the black market to obtain it.

Cute.

Originally Posted by Particle Man

True but the M probably made the full regimine of chemo possible for the kid to get through.

Its actually looking more and more like MJ itself fights cancer and shrinks tumors.

[shmike]

Originally Posted by Kaneman

Cute.

What's cute is your thread title which is absolute BS.

We know you like pot. We know it can help people.

Stretching the truth or flat out lying when posting about it doesn't help your cause.

[azoomm]

Ill informed Doctors piss me off... that is all.

[Kaneman]

Originally Posted by shmike

What's cute is your thread title which is absolute BS.

We know you like pot. We know it can help people.

Stretching the truth or flat out lying when posting about it doesn't help your cause.

Its absolute BS because....?

[Kaneman]

http://norml.org/index.cfm?Group_ID=6814

by Paul Armentano
Senior Policy Analyst
NORML | NORML Foundation

“Cannabinoids possess ... anticancer activity [and may] possibly represent a new class of anti-cancer drugs that retard cancer growth, inhibit angiogenesis (the formation of new blood vessels) and the metastatic spreading of cancer cells." So concludes a comprehensive review published in the October 2005 issue of the scientific journal Mini-Reviews in Medicinal Chemistry.

Not familiar with the emerging body of research touting cannabis' ability to stave the spread of certain types of cancers? You're not alone.

For over 30 years, US politicians and bureaucrats have systematically turned a blind eye to scientific research indicating that marijuana may play a role in cancer prevention -- a finding that was first documented in 1974. That year, a research team at the Medical College of Virginia (acting at the behest of the federal government) discovered that cannabis inhibited malignant tumor cell growth in culture and in mice. According to the study's results, reported nationally in an Aug. 18, 1974, Washington Post newspaper feature, administration of marijuana's primary cannabinoid THC, "slowed the growth of lung cancers, breast cancers and a virus-induced leukemia in laboratory mice, and prolonged their lives by as much as 36 percent."

Despite these favorable preclinical findings, US government officials dismissed the study (which was eventually published in the Journal of the National Cancer Institute in 1975), and refused to fund any follow-up research until conducting a similar -- though secret -- clinical trial in the mid-1990s. That study, conducted by the US National Toxicology Program to the tune of $2 million concluded that mice and rats administered high doses of THC over long periods experienced greater protection against malignant tumors than untreated controls.

Rather than publicize their findings, government researchers once again shelved the results, which only came to light after a draft copy of its findings were leaked in 1997 to a medical journal, which in turn forwarded the story to the national media.

Nevertheless, in the decade since the completion of the National Toxicology trial, the U.S. government has yet to encourage or fund additional, follow up studies examining the cannabinoids' potential to protect against the spread cancerous tumors.

Fortunately, scientists overseas have generously picked up where US researchers so abruptly left off. In 1998, a research team at Madrid's Complutense University discovered that THC can selectively induce apoptosis (program cell death) in brain tumor cells without negatively impacting the surrounding healthy cells. Then in 2000, they reported in the journal Nature Medicine that injections of synthetic THC eradicated malignant gliomas (brain tumors) in one-third of treated rats, and prolonged life in another third by six weeks.

In 2003, researchers at the University of Milan in Naples, Italy, reported that non-psychoactive compounds in marijuana inhibited the growth of glioma cells in a dose dependent manner and selectively targeted and killed malignant cancer cells.

The following year, researchers reported in the journal of the American Association for Cancer Research that marijuana's constituents inhibited the spread of brain cancer in human tumor biopsies. In a related development, a research team from the University of South Florida further noted that THC can also selectively inhibit the activation and replication of gamma herpes viruses. The viruses, which can lie dormant for years within white blood cells before becoming active and spreading to other cells, are thought to increase one's chances of developing cancers such as Karposis Sarcoma, Burkitts lymphoma, and Hodgkins disease.

More recently, investigators published pre-clinical findings demonstrating that cannabinoids may play a role in inhibiting cell growth of colectoral cancer, skin carcinoma, breast cancer, and prostate cancer, among other conditions. When investigators compared the efficacy of natural cannabinoids to that of a synthetic agonist, THC proved far more beneficial – selectively decreasing the proliferation of malignant cells and inducing apoptosis more rapidly than its synthetic alternative while simultaneously leaving healthy cells unscathed.

Nevertheless, US politicians have been little swayed by these results, and remain steadfastly opposed to the notion of sponsoring – or even acknowledging – this growing body clinical research, preferring instead to promote the unfounded notion that cannabis use causes cancer. Until this bias changes, expect the bulk of research investigating the use of cannabinoids as anticancer agents to remain overseas and, regrettably, overlooked in the public discourse.

[Kaneman]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tetrahydrocannabinol

Studies in animals and in vitro

New scientific evidence is showing that THC can prevent Alzheimer's Disease in an animal model by preventing the inflammation caused by microglia cells which are activated by binding of amyloid protein.[32]
In in-vitro experiments, THC at extremely high concentrations, which could not be reached with commonly-consumed doses, caused inhibition of plaque formation (which are associated with Alzheimer's disease) better than currently-approved drugs.[33]

THC may also be an effective anti-cancer treatment, with studies showing tumor size reduction in mice conducted in 1975[34] and 2007,[35] as well as in a pilot study in humans with glioblastoma multiforme (a type of brain cancer).[36]

A two-year study in which rats and mice were force-fed tetrahydrocannabinol dissolved in corn oil showed reduced body mass, enhanced survival rates, and decreased tumor incidences in several sites, mainly organs under hormonal control. It also caused testicular atrophy and uterine and ovarian hypoplasia, as well as hyperactivity and convulsions immediately after administration, of which the onset and frequency were dose related.[37]

Research in rats indicates that THC prevents hydroperoxide-induced oxidative damage as well as or better than other antioxidants in a chemical (Fenton reaction) system and neuronal cultures.[38] In mice low doses of Δ9-THC reduces the progression of atherosclerosis.[39]

Research has also shown that past claims of brain damage from cannabis use fail to hold up to the scientific method.[40] Instead, recent studies with synthetic cannabinoids show that activation of CB1 receptors can facilitate neurogenesis,[41] as well as neuroprotection,[42] and can even help prevent natural neural degradation from neurodegenerative diseases such as MS, Parkinson's, and Alzheimer's. This, along with research into the CB2 receptor (throughout the immune system), has given the case for medical marijuana more support.[43][44] THC is both a CB1 and CB2 agonist.[45]