3 ms·

>Let me put it this way: the big-pharma drug manufacturing (and more generally, medical-equipment manufacturing) pipeline is set up such that the only thing abo

>Let me put it this way: the big-pharma drug manufacturing (and more generally, medical-equipment manufacturing) pipeline is set up such that the only thing about a drug that should be able to kill someone, is if the drug's active ingredient itself has a bad interaction with their body. "Should be" is a giant risk factor... "Don't worry Mrs. Jones, this drug shouldn't be able to kill you unless you have a terrible allergic reaction!" Big-pharma has shown, repeatedly, that their sole motivation is not altruistic treatments of human aliments... it is that of any other corporate entity. Profit. I don't think that is inherently evil either. Medical cannabis could kill you... you are right, but I would argue that you are much more likely to be killed from alcohol or tobacco related events. For just one data point: I've worked in EMS for 14 years and I have never seen a cause of death that was directly the result of using cannabis. Unfortunately, I have lost track of how many people I have seen die that were the direct result of alcohol ingestion. Same for Oxycotin and other opioid based "medicine" prior to everyone and their brothers walking around with narcan.

derefr 7y ago
Certainly, the creation of novel molecular compounds is risky, and you can only mitigate the risks you know about. But that's not the comparison we're talking about here. We're not talking about smoking marijuana plant-matter vs. taking new GSK LessCancerPainIum™️. We're talking about smoking marijuana plant-matter vs. taking a pill that was created by processing grown marijuana plant-matter, or with an active ingredient synthesized to be identical to the ingredient-under-test of marijuana plant-matter. Personally, I've never heard of a case where Big Pharma has ever created a delivery vehicle for a well-known, Generally-Recognized-As-Safe active ingredient (like e.g. aspirin) that then kills, or even harms, people. Like, the Tylenol murders? Those were big news. It'd be even bigger news if the manufacturer themselves were responsible instead of some random MITM. But there has never been that kind of big news. They don't screw up when making pills. Pills are pills. Novel active ingredients can kill you. But—presuming the active ingredient is safe—the pills themselves killing you? When has that ever happened? > Unfortunately, I have lost track of how many people I have seen die that were the direct result of alcohol ingestion. Well, yeah; people are consuming arbitrary amounts of alcohol. That's what's bad about recreational alcohol use. Same goes for opioids, in a different sense; addiction drives you to consume arbitrary amounts of opioids. That's what's bad about drugs of abuse. And yet, as an EMT, you still stick car-crash victims with fentanyl, no? Even though it's an opioid, and potentially a vector for chemical dependence. But you're not likely to kill them with it. Why? Because it's a measured dose. ---- Note that I'm not arguing that the active ingredients in medical cannabis could kill anyone. It's been pretty well shown that they don't really have an LD50. It's not the active ingredients I'm worried about. It's the rest. It's the reason that hospitals don't get food for patients catered from arbitrary restaurants. You want to control all the variables you can. A CBD+THC tincture is going to have strictly fewer non-controlled variables than smoking the raw plant. A crystallized distillate suspended in a PEG gel pill is going to have fewer non-controlled variables still. It's not about not-killing people. It's about treating people, successfully, with the highest ROI per treatment-hour possible and the least time spent flailing around trying to diagnose unknown brokenness while the patient continues to suffer.
- cwkoss 7y ago
  Active ingredients in pharmaceuticals kill people all the time. I recommend looking up FDA black box warnings before taking any prescription. My doc prescribed something to me without knowing about a recent black box warning. FDA does a lot of good, but the trials that bring a drug to market are not foolproof, and many doctors prescribe off label. I would estimate that legally regulated cannabis's other ingredients are an order of magnitude or two less risky than taking any pharmaceutical that has come to market in the past 20 years.

derefr 7y ago

Certainly, the creation of novel molecular compounds is risky, and you can only mitigate the risks you know about. But that's not the comparison we're talking about here. We're not talking about smoking marijuana plant-matter vs. taking new GSK LessCancerPainIum™️. We're talking about smoking marijuana plant-matter vs. taking a pill that was created by processing grown marijuana plant-matter, or with an active ingredient synthesized to be identical to the ingredient-under-test of marijuana plant-matter. Personally, I've never heard of a case where Big Pharma has ever created a delivery vehicle for a well-known, Generally-Recognized-As-Safe active ingredient (like e.g. aspirin) that then kills, or even harms, people. Like, the Tylenol murders? Those were big news. It'd be even bigger news if the manufacturer themselves were responsible instead of some random MITM. But there has never been that kind of big news. They don't screw up when making pills. Pills are pills. Novel active ingredients can kill you. But—presuming the active ingredient is safe—the pills themselves killing you? When has that ever happened? > Unfortunately, I have lost track of how many people I have seen die that were the direct result of alcohol ingestion. Well, yeah; people are consuming arbitrary amounts of alcohol. That's what's bad about recreational alcohol use. Same goes for opioids, in a different sense; addiction drives you to consume arbitrary amounts of opioids. That's what's bad about drugs of abuse. And yet, as an EMT, you still stick car-crash victims with fentanyl, no? Even though it's an opioid, and potentially a vector for chemical dependence. But you're not likely to kill them with it. Why? Because it's a measured dose. ---- Note that I'm not arguing that the active ingredients in medical cannabis could kill anyone. It's been pretty well shown that they don't really have an LD50. It's not the active ingredients I'm worried about. It's the rest. It's the reason that hospitals don't get food for patients catered from arbitrary restaurants. You want to control all the variables you can. A CBD+THC tincture is going to have strictly fewer non-controlled variables than smoking the raw plant. A crystallized distillate suspended in a PEG gel pill is going to have fewer non-controlled variables still. It's not about not-killing people. It's about treating people, successfully, with the highest ROI per treatment-hour possible and the least time spent flailing around trying to diagnose unknown brokenness while the patient continues to suffer.

cwkoss 7y ago
Active ingredients in pharmaceuticals kill people all the time. I recommend looking up FDA black box warnings before taking any prescription. My doc prescribed something to me without knowing about a recent black box warning. FDA does a lot of good, but the trials that bring a drug to market are not foolproof, and many doctors prescribe off label. I would estimate that legally regulated cannabis's other ingredients are an order of magnitude or two less risky than taking any pharmaceutical that has come to market in the past 20 years.