Global Ganja Report

Israeli scientists have developed a non-psychoative cannabis variety, in what is being portrayed as a boost for medical marijuana. According to Israel's Maariv newspaper, the new variety looks, smells and even tastes "the same" as psychoactive varieties. "It has the same scent, shape and taste as the original plant—it's all the same—but the numbing sensation that users are accustomed to has disappeared," said Tzahi Klein, head of development at Tikkun Olam, the firm that developed what an AFP account calls "the species." Klein adds: "Many of our patients who tried the new plant come back to us and say: 'You tricked me'"—because they assumed they had been given a placebo.

The country's leading medical marijuana advocacy group, Americans for Safe Access (ASA), filed an appeal brief Jan. 26 in the DC Circuit to compel the federal government to reclassify cannabis for medical use. In July 2011, the federal Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) denied a petition filed in 2002 by the Coalition for Rescheduling Cannabis (CRC). The petition was denied only after the coalition sued the government for unreasonable delay. The ASA brief is an appeal of the rescheduling denial.

Earlier this month, the National Cancer Institute nodded to a growing body of studies indicating that one of the chemical compounds in cannabis slows—or stops—uncontrolled cell growth. In one study, tumors in lab mice shrank once exposed to the compound CBD. The NCI updated its website to include a reference to a "possible direct antitumor effect" from cannabis. But sometime since, the reference was removed, much to cannabis advocates' disgust.