Tuesday, January 24, 2012 -

    GW Pharmaceuticals And The UK Home Office – Corruption On A Grand Scale

    Click here for The Truth About Sativex

    GW Pharmaceuticals is engaged in a corrupt relationship with the British government.  It has been granted an unlawful monopoly of medicinal cannabis and is now selling its super-strong, super concentrated  51% THC skunk concentrate Sativex at 10 times the price that organised crime sells cannabis for on the streets.

    Freedom of information requests and licensing applications from other businesses are all refused out of hand.  The Home Office is intent on unlawful and corrupt protection of GW’s commercial interests.

    GW sells one 10ml bottle of Sativex to the NHS for around £175.  Pharmacologically identical products are available in medical marijuana dispensaries in the US at around $20 for a 50ml bottle.

    Meanwhile, GW’s cronies in the Home Office maintain and promote the lie that there “is no medicinal value” in cannabis.  When health authorities refuse to fund GW’s extortionate prices and sick people grow their own plants, virtually for free, the Home Office steps in with its cruel, corrupt and cowardly policy and sends them to jail.

    GW and the Home Office also conspire to deceive that Sativex contains only THC and CBD in order falsely to distinguish it from cannabis.  In fact, it is an whole plant extract containing all the 100+ cannabinoids, terpines, flavonoids and other compounds that occurr naturally in the plant.  Sativex IS cannabis.

    GW, its hired doctors and nurses and the Home Office also promote the lie that Sativex does “not produce the euphoria associated with recreational cannabis”.  Yet in the Sativex summary of product characteristics (SPC), a statutory document, “euphoric mood” is described as a “common” side effect.

    This is corruption, falsehood and organised, systematic deceit of the British people on a grand scale.

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    Related news:

    1. Home Office Refuses FOI Request Concerning GW Pharma’s Cannabis Licence
    2. Home Office Response To FOI Request Concerning Cannabis In The Media
    3. A Response To Lord Henley Of the Home Office Concerning Cannabis
    4. Legal Proceedings Have Been Issued Against The Home Secretary
    5. The Sativex Scam part 1
    • Stuart Wright

      I’m not saying you are lying by asking this, I just wonder how you know for sure that the entire plant is contained in Sativex? is this from personal research? or is it as simple as it being written in the ingredients etc?

      I’ve seen this statement written a few times on here and would like to the background evidence.

    • http://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=100002512306217 Çannabis Trüth

      Check the Sativex SPC – It is a whole plant extract http://www.medicines.org.uk/EMC/medicine/23262/SPC/Sativex+Oromucosal+Spray/

    • Anonymous

      Put simply they get two different cannabis plants (1 high THC & 1 High CBD) grind them up and use ethanol to extract all the chemicals from the resultant mush. they then do some big pharma magic to turn it into legal £175 per bottle cannabis tincture.

      Nothing you couldn’t do in the shed with a couple of cans of butane gas and a bag of trim – just don’t spark up a fag afterwards. 

    • http://twitter.com/WeedBaker Mark Baker

      Just watch this Stuart – this video shows the main guy at GW describing that it’s the whole plant…. pretty fascinating really, but also infuriating that no one is allowed to make their own!

    • Anonymous

      Why is this information having no effect? how are we ever to win this fight when our own Government is in on the corruption? I am utterly disgusted to read this. How dare they!

    • Stuart Sherriff

      Would you suggest that we get my dodgy mate kevin to supply the NHS?  If you’re going to deliver this product (which clearly works) at a clinical grade across the whole NHS then you need to pay for the product and the research that it takes to get it to that stage.  I utterly fail to see your point.   

    • Anonymous

      The point is cannabis is still classed as a schedule 1 drug (of no medicinal use) so how can GW have a license to grow cannabis, produce and distribute a tincture made from a drug “with no medical use” when joe public would get criminalised for growing it for medication.

      One rule for the 99% another rule for big pharma!

    • Anonymous

      “ If you’re going to deliver this product (which clearly works) at a clinical grade across the whole NHS then you need to pay for the product and the research that it takes to get it to that stage.  I utterly fail to see your point.”
      The point is that they are lying about what it contains.

    • http://www.peter-reynolds.co.uk Peter Reynolds

      The point is that GW’s monopoly is unlawful, dishonest, there are better) medicinal cannabis alternatives which should be equally available. GW’s pricing is exploitative precisely because of the monopoly which the Home Office works with it dishonestly to sustain.

      As for development and research costs, fair enough but GW’s have been modest. Most of the work has been done already.

    • Anonymous

      Please get real! It works obvoiusly and there are massive overheads, 10 years of research without selling a single dose to factor in to costs, it would be criminal for the government to then say to other companies ok thats the blueprint set up and make profit right away.  Stuart Sherrif is bang on when describing his dodgy mate Kevin, I’ve met him and he even wore a hoody!

    • Anonymous

      I understand that GW have always stated that Sativex is a whole plant extract and that, in fact, this complex pharmaceutically active combination of molecules contributes to it’s effectiveness.

      The key to the adoption of the preparation, and its take up by medical dispensers, is the standardisation of the constituents via a combination of cloned, genetically enhanced, plants and rigorous extraction engineering. 

      The cost is a function of the ten tears plus of bureaucratic hurdles required to satisfy regulators, rather than any attempt to manipulate profits.  Of course home grown cannabis has medical benefits – no doubt that’s why GW Pharma went down the path of cannaboid development.  But just as there is no prescription market for willow bark rather than aspirin, nor spiders’ web instead of penicillin, the adoption of cannaboids into mainstream medicine, does require a consistent product of proven efficacy at known doses.

      GW’s only monopoly is the licensing approvals it has obtained, and there is nothing to stop any other organisation going down the same path.

      The history of medicine development has been of increased regulation and cost in an attempt to avoid some of the harrowing disasters which have occurred in the past and that costs money, a lot of money.  I’ve heard that many of the very useful drugs available today would never have been licensed under the regulatory regime as it now stands – makes you wonder!

      Someone, please do post if I have any of the above wrong.

    • Anonymous

      For clarification, would you mind detailing GW’s development and research costs, and detailing the better medicinal cannabis alternatives, together with the links to the supporting peer reviewed published research.

    • http://www.peter-reynolds.co.uk Peter Reynolds

      Mostly agreed.  However, Bedrocan achieve standardised constituents in its herbal products.

      It’s not true that “there is nothing to stop any other organisation going down the same path.”  I know from personal experience of working with two other organisations trying to do so.

    • http://www.peter-reynolds.co.uk Peter Reynolds

      Not a complete answer to your question because I can’t spend the next month working on it!

      This is the alternative and it is exported all over Europe.

      http://www.bedrocan.nl

    • http://www.facebook.com/people/Derek-Williams/1072934911 Derek Williams

      Couple of points willythewonka:

      1: There is no “genetic enhancement” of the plants they grow. SATIVEX is a blend of two existing strains, one Sativa and one Ruderallis.

      2: GW own the patent on the delivery system, so no other company can make SATIVEX spray without paying them for the right to use the spray technology.

      3: The Dutch medical cannabis “Bedrocan” etc is a precribed cannabis http://www.cannabisbureau.nl/en/doc/pdf/5089-A5-BMC-Pat-ENG-web_25097.pdf 

      The point about cannabis is that it is actually very easy to grow a consitent product with a totally reproducable composition, all you have to do is to grow specific strains in carefully controlled ways.

      Finally, cannabis has been tested rather a lot on people for the past 5000 years, I think we know what the risks of it are by now. It’s hardly a new drug.

    • Anonymous

      Somewhat unprofessional don’t you think to make the statement you have on GW’s development costs but not have done the research to back it up.

      On Bedrocan, there is no recognised consistency which would satisfy regulatory authorities, not kust in the UK but in many other countries.

      I’m sure GW would have much rather saved their development costs and launched a cheaper product – don’t blame them for the system.  If you review the barriers put in their way at every stage of the development of Sativex, I’m sure you would agree that they have had anything but a cosy relationship with the Home Office et al.

      However, I do agree that:

      1. Big pharma may have a vested interest in overkill regulation to keep out the minnows, and

      2. The Home Office may well see Sativex as a means of avoiding having to engage in a debate on the general legalisation of cannabis.  Its position is of course untenable!  I would have thought that GW would welcome general legalisation – it would remove stigma whilst still allowing them to market Sativex into those sectors where licensing is required for the reasons I have previously posted.

    • http://www.peter-reynolds.co.uk Peter Reynolds

      Willy, I’m starting to enjoy debating with you so knock off the knocking copy, eh?  I think we both have the same intentions.

      I understand exactly your point.  I understand Big Pharma for I have taken its shilling myself.  I was a supporter and advocate for GW until Justin Gover started his cheap little attacks on “crude herbal cannabis”.

      I am quite happy that they used a white lie to gain approval – that it’s an extract of THC/CBD that doesn’t get you high but I think the HO is so embarrassed that its now a hush up job.
      I also know, first hand, that other businesses are actively discouraged and deflected from applying for licences. 

      It’s now become a fundamentally dishonest and corrupt arrangement.

    • Anonymous

      Together with my posted reply to Peter.

      I agree.  You’re arguing with the wrong guy.  Take it up with the regulators for what good it will do – when did any bureaucracy ever reduce control with out being coerced!

      If the argument is that the authorities attitude towards cannabis, and the irrational nature of drug licensing, then all power to it.  But to extrapolate the trials and tribulations GW has had to endure to bring Sativex to license as some sort of cosily based corruption is unsupportable, superficial and, I believe, does Clear a disservice.

      Regarding the spray technology patent, then why not.  It can’t be beyond the wit of others to develop an alternative delivery system at their own expense.

    • Anonymous

      Likewise and OK, no knocking copy (and better proofreading) if you’ll separate opinion from fact!

      I guess you should ask Justin Gover to explain in this thread his attitude toward herbal cannabis – I can see how that would have touched a nerve!

      Maybe the issue on extending licenses is to do with each application needing to be supported by the same level of research data for its formulation as GW had to for Sativex.  The whole process should never have been as convoluted as it has been but, having surmounted the hurdles with huge frustration, pain and expense, you can hardly expect GW to vote for Christmas!