Canada has become the first country in the world to approve the sale of a cannabis-based prescription painkiller. Cannabis sativa L. has won approval from Health Canada regulators for treatment of a severe form of pain common among sufferers of multiple sclerosis, but it may also find favor with those with nerve pain related to conditions ranging from shingles to cancer.

The drug, marketed in Canada by Bayer HealthCare under the brand name Sativex, is sprayed under the tongue or inside the cheek.

While it contains the active ingredients that give pot smokers their buzz, including delta-9-tetrahydrocannabinol (THC) and cannabidiol (CBD), the drug does not intoxicate users. "These people are not feeling intoxicated by the drug, partly because the type of cannabinoids that have been isolated and purified work more specifically at the targeted pain receptors," said Dr. Virginia Devonshire, a neurologist at the University of British Columbia.

Patients who will be prescribed the drug will also be suffering from neuropathic pain, which is excruciating and can be provoked by movement, touch or temperature.

"It's like being plugged into an electric socket all the time," said Steve Walsh of Milton, Ontario, who has endured neuropathic pain in his hand for five years since being diagnosed with MS.

The move was applauded by those with the disease and proponents of medical uses for marijuana.

"This confirms that virtually everything the U.S. government has told us about marijuana is wrong," said Rob Kampia, executive director of the Marijuana Policy Project in Washington, D.C. The organization is fighting to have marijuana legalized for medical use. "This product offers patients and doctors a new option and we hope Americans will have access to it soon."

In the United States, the federal government has classified marijuana as a drug that is as dangerous as heroin, although 10 states have passed laws that allow its use under medical supervision.

Sativex should be on the market in Canada before summer. The price of the drug has not yet been established.

While a number of drugs use synthesized forms of cannabis, this is the first to use marijuana extracts. The British drug company that developed Sativex, GW Pharmaceuticals, has been harvesting 40,000 pot plants in a secret location to produce the drug.

http://www.detnews.com/2005/health/0504/27/A10-157535.htm