LONDON: If you want the benefits of medical marijuana without the "unwanted side effects" of cannabis, here is a piece of news for you. 

A new research suggests that fenofibrate - a common drug used to control cholesterol levels in patients - activates the same receptors as cannabis and may become a viable treatment option for relieving pain, stimulating appetite, reducing nausea and preventing depression. 
"By illustrating the relationship between fenofibrate and the cannabinoid system, we aim to improve our understanding of this clinically important drug," said researcher Richard S. Priestley from the University of Nottingham, England. 

A new party campaigning for the relaxation of the laws on cannabis will spark up debate after it secured a party political broadcast in Northern Ireland.

Their breakthrough came last night when they recruited a third candidate to run for them, automatically qualifying them for a broadcast.

The party is called Cista (Cannabis Is Safer Than Alcohol) and its latest recruit is Neil Paine, a 45-year-old former British soldier who lives in Coleraine. He is standing in East Londonderry where he hopes to unseat Gregory Campbell of the DUP.

Recent studies have indicated that Alzheimers is now the 4th biggest fear amongst the UK public, afterCancer, Debt and Knife Crime. This is an indication of the severity of a disease which results in nearly 500,000 deaths worldwide every year.

London, UK, 31 March 2015: GW Pharmaceuticals plc (Nasdaq: GWPH, AIM: GWP, “GW,” “the Company” or “the Group”), a biopharmaceutical company focused on discovering, developing and commercializing novel therapeutics from its proprietary cannabinoid product platform, announces it has initiated the Phase 3 part of a Phase 2/3 clinical trial of Epidiolex® (cannabidiol or CBD) for the treatment of Dravet syndrome, a rare and catastrophic treatment-resistant form of childhood epilepsy. GW anticipates that top-line data from this trial will be available around the end of 2015.

Last week’s Vienna meeting of the UN’s Commission on Narcotic Drugs was an important stepping stone on the road to 2016, when world leaders will come together in New York to discuss drug policy in a special session of the UN General Assembly, also known as the UNGASS.

As dry as these diplomatic gatherings appear, they play a key role in our effort to end the war on drugs; try new approaches to drug policy that reduce harm; end the criminalisation of drug users and keep non-violent drug offenders out of prison; and treat drugs overall as a health issue. 

As hemp makes a comeback in the U.S. after a decades-long ban on its cultivation, scientists are reporting that fibers from the plant can pack as much energy and power as graphene, long-touted as the model material for supercapacitors. They’re presenting their research, which a Canadian start-up company is working on scaling up, at the 248th National Meeting & Exposition of the American Chemical Society (ACS), the world’s largest scientific society.

Although hemp (cannabis sativa) and marijuana (cannabis sativa var. indica) come from a similar species of plant, they are very different and confusion has been caused by deliberate misinformation with far reaching effects on socioeconomics as well as on environmental matters.

A NEW political party campaigning for the legalisation of cannabis is to field a candidate in the Capital at the general election.

Cista – which stands for Cannabis Is Safer Than Alcohol – was set up just last month but plans to contest around 40 seats across the UK on May 7, including Edinburgh South West, where former Chancellor Alistair Darling is standing down.

Party leader Paul Birch, who co-founded social networking site Bebo before it was sold to AOL for £570 million, said Britain’s drug laws were “pretty messed up right now”.

He said: “There has been a lot of progress in other countries – there 700 cannabis social clubs in Spain, cannabis has been legalised in four American states and the number is growing every year.

The article in the DailyMail states that a man died after suffering heart problems as a result of a decade-long addiction to cannabis, an inquest heard.

“John O’Brien, 53, from Salford, began smoking cannabis to cope with life-changing brain injuries sustained in a car crash.

But over a ten-year period, the Class B drug took its toll on his body and caused his heart to stop working.

A coroner at Bolton Coroner’s Court ruled in December 2014 that Mr O’Brien died from cannabis cardiotoxicity, a little known condition in which smoking cannabis triggers heart problems.”

Charles Walker MP, Parliament’s cheerleader for the ‘skunk scaremongers’ shot himself and his hysterical campaign in the foot this week.

He had submitted a parliamentary written question asking: "How many people under 18 years of age have been treated in NHS-funded mental health units for cannabis-induced psychosis in each of the last five years?”

The answer from Jane Ellison MP, minister of state at the Department of Health, must have gravely disappointed Mr Walker. She revealed there have been average of just over 28 ‘finished admission episodes’ for each of the past five years. That doesn’t necessarily mean 28 people as it could include the same person being admitted more than once.

’ve spoken to dozens upon dozens of people about whether or not some drugs should be legalised – those for, those against – and there are some undeniably valid opinions on both sides.

I want to lay bare the truth of these conversations, outlining the most salient arguments, and see where the dust settles.

Last week MM spoke to pro-cannabis campaigner Colin Davies, who believes Manchester should use the extra powers offered through ‘devo-Manc’ to become the UK’s first cannabis decriminalisation trial.

Standby also for the thoughts of former Labour spin doctor Alastair Campbell and the leader of the Pirate Party UK, Loz Kaye.