Medical Marijuana Inc (MJNA)

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General History

Cannabis sativa and cannabis indica (marijuana) has a long and distinguished history as a medicinal herb. The Chinese emperor Shen-nung was the first to record the medical use of cannabis in 2737 B. C. Many cultures, however, have recognized the therapeutic benefits of the cannabis plant. Among them are: India, Persia, Assyria, Greece, Africa, South America, Turkey, and Egypt.

In Western medicine cannabis enjoyed its heyday during the 19th Century. In the late 1830s, Dr. William B. O'Shaughnessy, a British physician at the Medical College of Calcutta, learned of cannabis and began experimenting with various cannabis preparations. He determined the drug was safe and effective in treating rabies, rheumatism, epilepsy and tetanus.

O'Shaughnessy published his studies in a forty page article entitled "On the preparations of the Indian Hemp or Gunjah," in 1839. This marked the beginning of an intensive period of study throughout Europe and America. More than 100 articles were published between 1840 and 1900. Many prominent physicians, including Queen Victoria's personal physician, J. R. Reynolds, studied cannabis. Reynolds declared it "by far the most useful of drugs" in treating "painful maladies."

In America, the first extensive study of cannabis in medicine was completed in 1860 by the Ohio Medical Society. Physicians reported success in treating stomach pain and gastric distress, psychosis, chronic cough, gonorrhea and neuralgia.

At the turn of the century, the drug began to fall into disuse. Cannabis was difficult to store and its extracts were variable in their effect. As new drugs were developed in the early 1900s, cannabis was less widely used but still available by prescription and in some over-the-counter preparations.

The Marijuana Tax Act of 1937, intended to prohibit marijuana's social use, was most effective in prohibiting medical use of the drug. Strict regulations governing cultivation of the plant made its production impractical. New synthetic drugs caught the fancy of physicians and cannabis was used less frequently, Finally, in 1942, the Federal Bureau of Narcotics convinced the U. S. Pharmacopeia to remove the drug from its listing.

In the 1970s, cannabis was "re-discovered" as a medical substance. Controlled studies have revealed its therapeutic utility in the treatment of cancer chemotherapy side-effects, glaucoma, and spasticity ailments. Federal regulations continue to make research with the drug very difficult, however, and many promising areas of therapeutic application have received little or no attention. These include: asthma, AIDS, epilepsy, analgesic action, tumor retardation, nervous disorders, and mental illness.