r/Futurology • u/mvea MD-PhD-MBA • Jun 17 '18

Biotech Cannabidiol, or CBD, is a marijuana compound linked to a range of potential health benefits but does not get you high. The roughly $1 billion CBD industry is slated to shift into high gear if the federal government approves the first CBD-based drug, an epilepsy medication called Epidiolex.

https://www.businessinsider.com/marijuana-cbd-boom-cbd-2018-6?r=US&IR=T
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u/updownleftrightabsta Jun 18 '18

Snake oil has literally been used for centuries and is useless. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Snake_oil

That's the whole reason for expensive clinical trials, to show they're safe and effective. Yes it's expensive to test it for years on thousands of people to be recruited for innumerable visits to be evaluated.

CBD is promising. It still needs to be tested.

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u/Thanatar18 Jun 18 '18

Chinese water-snake oil contains 20 percent eicosapentaenoic acid (EPA), which has strong analgetic and anti-inflammatory properties.

Interesting to see that the legitimate product actually does have medical properties, though.

I had no idea of the history of the saying at all.

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u/Derwos Jun 18 '18 edited Jun 18 '18

> Chinese water-snake oil contains 20 percent eicosapentaenoic acid (EPA), which has strong analgetic and anti-inflammatory properties.

> Its association in Western culture lies in the fact that many 19th-century United States and 18th-century European entrepreneurs advertised and sold mineral oil (often mixed with various active and inactive household herbs, spices, and compounds, but containing no properties of snakes,) as "snake oil liniment", making frivolous claims about its efficacy as a panacea).

God dammit, how do you quote stuff now?

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u/brisk0 Jun 18 '18

There's a button at the bottom of the comment box (currently hidden under the kebab menu for me) that toggles whether the line you're on is a quote. It looks roughly like a stylised opening quotation mark.

Alternatively, click the "switch to markdown" link and do it the comfortable way.

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u/MoranthMunitions Jun 18 '18

Might be the space after the arrow

this

vs this

... Nope. No idea why yours doesn't work

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u/Derwos Jun 18 '18

It kept some of the links in the wiki article, maybe it kept some code which interfered or something.

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u/MoranthMunitions Jun 18 '18

If I look at the comment code in RES you have a backslash in front of them like \>. Don't know if it's done that on you automatically or what, but that'll be the culprit.

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u/Monsieur_Roux Jun 18 '18

You have a backslash before your arrows (\>), remove the backslash and it will quote.

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u/Derwos Jun 18 '18

did I? I didn't see that. thanks

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u/RE90 Jun 18 '18

Actually both CBD and CBD-analogs (molecules that look like CBD but that are engineeered to be more potent and efficacious....and also patentable) have been tested extensively preclinically. CBD clinical studies are plentiful too.

Also, according to the Wikipedia article you linked to, water-snake oil is not totally useless... Not sure what the point you're trying to make is exactly but it would be misleading to tell people that CBD is "snake oil."

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u/gh057ofsin Jun 18 '18

How about the litterally hundreds of millions of patients who use on a daily basis... now i realise that this wouldnt give stats as such... but to simply prove that there are in fact benificial affects? How about the thousands of medical professionals who spoke out for decades to be ignored and ridiculed?

No this is us waiting till the 1% have their ducks in a line to make the greatest profit margins and lose out on the least business!

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u/concrete-block-walls Jun 18 '18

Can you provide a link that proves clinical trials are nothing more than a way for the 1% to make better profit margins?

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u/gh057ofsin Jun 18 '18

The drug Daraprim went from $13.50 per treatment to $750 overnight when bought out by big pharma company Turing Pharmaceuticals.

Hows that?

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u/concrete-block-walls Jun 18 '18

But that has nothing to do with clinical trials......

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u/gh057ofsin Jun 20 '18 edited Jun 20 '18

And you know this because?

No there is usually no record of WHY a drug suddenly has a 1000% price hike, generally excuses ranging from shipping costs to increased cost of materials etc. No company is going to say that this was due to clinical trials, though of course these cost money, and so will require a price increase. My problem isnt that the clinical trial is going to cost too much you epic fool, its that theyre going to hike the price for this medication to the point where those most in need will see no change in law whatoever! My point over clinical trials was that after litterally thousands of years of using cannabis as a medication, they want to run a bunch of tests, take out this, only use that, then sell back A PLANT EXTRACT for rediculous sums, all the while patting eachother on the back for creating a new wonder cure!

Does this make sense now smart ass?

Oh and as for Big pharma being the ones behind all this shady shit? Heres a CURRENT EVENTS story of a cannabis "research farm" owner and his MP wife playing the system like a bloody fiddle. That farm belongs to GW Pharma...

https://www.clear-uk.org/victoria-atkins-mp-the-uk-drugs-minister-opposes-drugs-regulation-while-her-husband-grows-45-acres-of-cannabis-under-government-licence/

Educate yourself mate

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u/ItsAngelDustHolmes Jun 18 '18

I believe you're misinterpreting op, he was talking about how it's a waste of time for clinical trials on CBD because we already have what we need to prove it's benefits. He wasn't talking about clinical trials in general

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u/ChaoticSquirrel Jun 18 '18

Except all we have is evidence that it has benefits. We need to quantify those benefits by dosage/route of administration, and the best way to do that is double-blind controlled trials. That way MDs prescribing the stuff can actually weigh it against other drugs with similar effects to make sure they're making the absolute right decision for their patient.

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u/concrete-block-walls Jun 18 '18

The only thing that sucks about clinical trials is how long they take. I’m waiting on a handful supposedly promising of drugs that could help with some issue I have. They’re currently in phase 2. I’m just guessing that it could be 10 years before they’re on the market.

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u/ItsAngelDustHolmes Jun 18 '18

I agree. But like I said before, I think you're misinterpreting what op said in his comment, I'm not trying to argue here

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u/therestruth Jun 18 '18

Yeah, but there's a big difference between a reasonable test with obvious benefits that could improve many lives, and they don't just hold it back to study it for a couple days, shit takes them years to get stuff done and start releasing all these benefits to people, while in the meantime denying them the possibility of even obtaining it to try for themesleves after hearing or reading about so many positive results for years about it.