In 2013, cardiologist Dr. David Allen conducted a survey at US universities to determine which schools taught about the endocannabinoid system (ECS). Only 13 percent of medical schools mentioned it in their curricula. This isn't about cannabis, but rather a neurotransmitter system discovered in the early 1990s. Neurotransmitters are chemical messengers that transmit signals from one nerve cell to other cells at chemical synapses. It is scientifically proven that the ECS is crucial for maintaining homeostasis in the body. And yet, medical students are not taught about it.
If a doctor is unfamiliar with the endocannabinoid system (ECS) and its components, such as the neurotransmitters anandamide, 2AG, and dopamine, and their effects on the body, they will also fail to understand how cannabis can be used as a medication for migraines, multiple sclerosis, epilepsy, Crohn's disease, arthritis, chronic pain, and many other ailments and diseases. This is incomprehensible to cannabis patients.
The US federal government has done much to suppress discussion about the endocannabinoid system (ECS). Strangely, it has been particularly keen to misrepresent the medical benefits of cannabis and its cannabinoids – even though the US Department of Health and Human Services holds a patent on the popular cannabinoid CBD. Furthermore, the US government has known since 1974 that cannabis kills cancer cells.
An example that illustrates this point is the way the US government handled important research by the respected University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA) pulmonologist, Dr. Donald Tashkin. Tashkin was tasked by the National Institute on Drug Abuse (NIDA) with proving a link between smoking cannabis and lung cancer. His study, however, proved the opposite.
Tashkin's team surveyed 1,212 patients registered with the Los Angeles Cancer Registry. His control group consisted of 1,040 cancer-free citizens matched for age, sex, and demographics. Tashkin found that increased cannabis use did not lead to a higher risk of developing lung cancer. In fact, they had a lower risk than those who did not smoke at all. Tobacco smokers, on the other hand, were at greater risk the more they consumed. Tobacco smokers who also smoked cannabis were able to slightly reduce their risk.
But that wasn't what the US government wanted to hear. Dr. Tashkin's research findings were suppressed, and they tried to undermine his credibility. Instead of his results, the government seized upon a much smaller study from New Zealand. This study had indeed reached the same conclusions, except for a handful of very heavy users. These were too few to be representative. However, the US government used precisely these statistically insignificant outliers to prove the dangers of smoking cannabis. They misrepresented the results of the New Zealand study, claiming it contradicted Tashkin's. The media also ignored the very small sample size of the study—79 smokers participated, 21 of whom smoked only cannabis—and published this misinterpretation of the study as the latest findings.
This is concerning, and one should ask what other lies we are being told about cannabis. The existence of the endocannabinoid system in our bodies should be proof enough that it is not a dangerous drug and that it has great medical potential as a medicinal plant. It is hoped that the ECS will very soon find its place in medicine, and that medical students will not be deprived of this knowledge. Patients worldwide are sharing their positive experiences with cannabis as medicine. Hopefully, doctors will no longer be able to ignore this.
