Medical Marijuana Could Cure H1N1 Swine Flu

Medical Marijuana Could Cure H1N1 Swine Flu

Chicago : While medical marijuana has garnered a great deal of attention lately in helping patients deal with chronic pain, Melamede has another application in mind; he believes it can curb death risk from the swine flu.

The approach relies on the principle that the chemicals in marijuana known as cannabinoids have a dampening effect on the immune system. Melamede said doctors may be able to take advantage of this effect to curb the risk of death from the immune system overdrive that resulted in many of the deaths of young adults during the 1918 influenza pandemic -- a scenario that some worry could occur once more if swine flu were to become more virulent.

It's a controversial approach -- and few infectious disease experts believe health officials will be quick to approve marijuana prescriptions for sick kids. Dr. Len Horovitz, a pulmonary specialist at Lenox Hill Hospital in New York City, is one expert who is troubled by the implications of "giving out THC like water."

"I don't think many parents would want their kids 'on drugs' for a mild, flu-like illness," he said, "and it's sure to raise hackles with the anti-drug people."

Still, Cannabis Science, an emerging pharmaceutical cannabis company of which Melamede is president and CEO, is working on an edible form of medicinal marijuana that its officials think will help treat many infectious diseases, swine flu included. Last month, the company announced its intention to apply to the U.S. Food and Drug Administration's fast track approval process in the hope of making its anti-flu lozenge available for a possible second wave of swine flu.

Melamede said he has already tried the approach himself. In February, when he contracted a nasty flu -- a bout he suspects was related to the H1N1 swine flu virus -- he said he took medicinal marijuana to help his body fight it off.

When you catch the flu, your immune system launches a massive attack on the virus that causes excessive inflammation. This is where the runny nose, sore throat and achiness come from.

While it is necessary for fighting off the virus, this overwhelming inflammation can start to kill your own cells and, if it gets out of hand, it can lead to organ failure and death.

When inflammation goes off the handle, the body releases endocannabinoids, which are natural chemicals that suppress the immune system, taking down the inflammation before it does more harm than good. This endocannabinoid system, as it's called, is one of the many systems responsible for maintaining balance and health in the body.

In more severe strains of the flu, like avian flu, the endocannabinoid system can't always keep up. When this happens, the organs, particularly the lungs, fail.

"They die not from the virus itself but from their own immune response," Melamede said.

Curbing Immune Response With Cannabis

This is where, according to Cannabis Science, marijuana comes in. Because the marijuana plant contains natural, plant-based cannabinoids, called phytocannabinoids, giving cannabis to someone with the flu supplements their body's endocannabinoid system and helps take down the inflammation.

"Contemporary antiviral medical technology is currently inadequate to meet the world's immediate challenges," Melamede said in a press release issued last week. "We believe that cannabis extract-based medicines can reduce influenza deaths."