- I’m no conspiracy theorist but this is iffy
- UK pain sufferers are desperate for CBD and yet they’re not getting the natural medicine they need
- Why Big Pharmas want you to pay more for pain relief
I’m not a big conspiracy theorist.
You won’t find me in a tinfoil hat, going on about faked moon landings, dead Martians in government lock-ups, the earth being flat or Elvis being alive and well.
That said, I don’t always believe everything I read in the media.
And I know there are sometimes other stories behind the news stories we read…
That’s because I know that corporations, governments and powerful institutions deliberately manipulate the public. They feed specific stories to the press in order to lay the groundwork for policies that will benefit them in the future. Or they make attacks on their rivals dressed up as ‘science’ or ‘research’.
For instance, my sceptical radar was activated this week when I read a story on the BBC about CBD medicines.
Just to recap quickly, in case you missed my previous emails on this…
Cannabinoids, or ‘CBDs’, come from the cannabis plant but don’t have psychoactive properties, so you don’t get high from them.
They help with problems such as chronic pain, anxiety, nausea and vomiting, epilepsy, dementia, heart disease, high blood pressure, diabetes, arthritis and insomnia.
Here’s our page all about it, so give this a read and if you fancy trialling CBD, you’ll see our recommendation: [Click Here] LINK TO CBD 10% OIL
Ok, so here we have a natural product that people are using widely for pain, anxiety, epilepsy, brain health and blood pressure… and with plenty of reported success, as well as highly qualified scientists giving it the thumbs up.
Yet on the BBC we had this story.
‘Lack of evidence’ holding back cannabis medicines
The article explained how, at the end of last year, it finally became legal for doctors to prescribe CBD to patients.
As soon as this happened, thousands of people were desperate to get access to CBD for their serious health issues, but couldn’t because of a lack of evidence that they work.
A review claimed that GPs were unsure of the benefits and long-term safety of the drugs because of a lack of randomised clinical trials.
So these drugs aren’t being prescribed as they should.
But here’s what I’m wondering…
And you can call me a conspiracy theorist if you like, what might be the role of Big Pharma in all this?
After all, this is a natural product which isn’t in the sole control of any corporation, where small companies are able to create their own CBD products.
That isn’t a situation Big Pharma likes very much and I highly suspect that what will happen now is a steady attack on the ‘quality’ of CBD products.
This will lead to clinical trials, funded by Big Pharma, that favours the CBD medicines over which they have ‘intellectual property’ and which they can control.
Think of it this way…
Last year global spending on pharmaceutical research and development amounted to almost $8 trillion.
A crazy amount of money!
But it’s money well spent, as these trials lead to the development of drugs that they can own, so they can have more control over the marketplace, and prices, to make more profit.
As one American expert on cannabis investing puts it:
“Traditional pharmaceutical companies are in the unenviable position of having to play both offence and defence at the same time.
Offence is developing cannabinoid-based drugs that fit the pharmaceutical model of having patent protections that can be used to defend a high price for years.
But to maintain it, they have to defend against the encroachment of far cheaper treatments with a growing body of evidence to justify their use.”
So it wouldn’t surprise me if this kind of thing is influencing the problems GPs are having in the UK right now.
Why CBD ‘should’ be plentiful and affordable
And here’s another iffy part of the CBD story.
In May last year the drugs minister Victoria Atkins – who is a supporter of a drugs policy which makes cannabis illegal – admitted that her husband worked for a company which grew medicinal cannabis in the UK.
Not only is that hypocritical but it also shows that we are growing plenty of our own cannabis in the UK, which should make it accessible and affordable.
However, it is being exported to the USA for higher prices, and not to the NHS.
Here is what the Spectator magazine says:
“The truth is that Britain has a thriving ‘legal’ cannabis industry. It uses Home Office permissions, as well as some legal loopholes, to generate hundreds of millions of pounds in revenue each year – with full support from the British government, which takes a cut from the proceeds. Last year, a UN report revealed that the success of this venture had made Britain the biggest producer and exporter of legal cannabis in the world.”
Can you see why I’m suspicious?
This is HUGE business. A lot of shady dealings are happening behind the scenes and a lot of people are getting rich, while people in pain struggle to get the help they need.
Hey, but maybe I’m wrong and all the powers-that-be are just trying their best to help(!).
Either way, the perils of CBD’s success is that a lot of big companies and governments are now desperate to control the market – that’s just the way capitalism works.
But I believe that people in pain deserve to have access to affordable CBD products, and we should call out any sneaky behaviour when we suspect it.
