Marinol (Dronabinol) 100% pure THC. Proven mainly ineffective.

I just realized that a lot of people are just now figuring out that there is a legally manufactured pill in the United States that contains 100% THC. This pill named Marinol has been on the market for over 40 years and was introduced as a marijuana alternative.

The reason why you don't hear about it is simple, it is only FDA-Approved to treat 2 things. Chemotherapy Patients who experience vomiting. As well as, patients who cannot eat usually AIDs patients.

The company that formulated this pill was not thinking clearly when they introduced it. They must not of done enough clinical trials. Marinol is of course in pill form, meaning you can easily take too much, the intake period is between 1 and 4 hours until you get the effects. You still receive the negative effects from Marijuana as well. They say it is really close to actual Marijuana which is completely false. A 30 day supply without insurance is close to $900.

The reason why Marinol is not effective in treating other diseases and conditions is simple. It is proven that Cannabidiols work together as they are absorbed into the body. You cannot just use THC, you will not get the normal effects of Marijuana as you'd expect.

A study was conducted for patients suffering from MD. Three groups were selected. One group would receive only THC, the second group would receive only CBD. The third group would receive a combination of both THC and CBD. The study revealed that patients must be administered both of the drugs at the same time to receive the "analgesic effects" (Or, pain-relieving effects).

This is the main reason why Marinol is not approved at the Federal level for treatment of many conditions and diseases. At the state level, Medicinal Marijuana is approved for numerous conditions, including those used for Marinol. Chemotherapy Patients prefer Medicinal Marijuana compared to Marinol because they can limit the amount the intake and they can also receive the full effects in around 20 minutes. As compared to Marinol at 1 to 4 hours.

Respectively used from Wikipedia.org

Now tell me, do you see a big difference in what Marinol can treat and what Medicinal Marijuana can treat? It is easy to take too much Marinol because it only contains THC and has no CBD to counteract the full THC effect.

Before Marinol was even allowed in the general market, The National Cancer Institute sent out Marinol for experimental distribution. Reports came back saying that thousands of patients found Marijuana more safe and effective than synthetic-THC. The government ignored the studies and still gave Marinol a green light, it was accepted by the FDA as a Schedule II drug. Marijuana still remaining a Schedule I drug to this day.

The government then quickly sold the patent to Unimed Pharmaceuticals, which is the only company allowed to distribute any type of THC products legally at the federal level in the United States, armed with the government behind them, Unimed began targeting cancer patients for profit.

The synthetic-THC is not removed from the plant as you would think but actually acquired through from the compounds tempere olivitol and paramenthide or PMD. PMD is found to be highly unstable and caused many explosions while being produced.

Marinol contains 98+% of THC which leads to more negative side effects while Marijuana only contains around 6-20%. But Marijuana also contains CBD which acts as a sort of counter towards some of the negative effects. The government is against natural THC so much that they would release reports that were later found to be false. They tried to say that Lung Cancer was associate with inhalation of burned Marijuana. A panel of Scientists took this information and re-did the tests only to find the exact opposite results. The report found that marijuana was actually found to prevent malignancies not cause them.

A patient that had Glaucoma that is legally prescribed marijuana through the government, went around and talked to over a hundred AIDs patients that have taken Marinol and Marijuana. Out of all of them only one single person said that they preferred Marinol to Marijuana. A lot of controversy exists between these two drugs because Marinol has a higher dosage of THC which can lead to heightened side effects not commonly associated with Natural Marijuana. Yet, Marinol is a Schedule II drug, while Marijuana(known to be less harmful and have greater effects) is a Schedule I drug. With higher doses of THC memory loss is more consistent as well.

Government agencies go on to say that the amount of tar produced from a Marijuana cigarette is up to 4x as much as a Tobacco cigarette. Well something seems fishy, seeing how there is no Marijuana inhalation related deaths ever reported. But over 400,000 inhalation deaths due from Tobacco every year. They made this up to make it seem like it was more safe to take Marinol instead of regular Marijuana.

In conclusion, I want everyone to know that Marijuana and Synthetic-THC Marinol are two completely different things. Marijuana is overall more preferred, has less side effects, and a lot of positive effects as well.

What I have learned from studying this and what I think lead to the production of Marinol is that, the government realized that the people actually needed THC because it was one of the only things that could actually work towards their conditions. Also to slow down the increased rate of illegal marijuana smokers they developed the idea to create a Synthetic-THC capsule.

Marinol and Marijuana totally different. One is synthetic and never even uses the cannabis plant. While one is a naturally occurring plant with healing and pain relieving properties among other things.

 

Don't get me wrong, it is FDA approved to increase appetite, it does have it's benefits but your grandfather would have most likely been better off actually smoking cannabis. Marinol is an FDA approved drug so it must have actual uses. Which it does, but there are definitely better alternatives. *Cough... Marijuana.

 

You know what's funny GW Pharmaceuticals is actually the company that found Synthetic-THC to be not as effective when used without cannabidiols in their own private funded trials. But i'm pretty sure it's Sativex is not approved by the FDA in the US.

 

In most cases yes, the Synthetic-THC pill "Marinol" can take up to four hours to come into effect so it's rather useless for someone vomiting. But with actual Marijuana the effects are there in 20-30 minutes solving the problem.

 

Marinol is very expensive because the THC used in Marinol is not even from the cannabis plant! That's why they have to call it synthetic-THC, and the way of obtaining the main items that make up THC use a process that is highly explosive and dangerous. Plus Marinol is overly expensive if you don't have insurance. Plus the prescription isn't that easy to obtain either because most doctors don't like to administer Marinol because they know how negative a drug it is. Yeah, just a 30 day supply is close to $900 without insurance and it's hard to get insurance if you have Cancer or Aids...

$900 divided by 30 days = $30 a day. What a waste, imagine if you stocked up $900 worth of cannabis how long it would take to smoke it all? It would most likely last longer than 30 days.

Did you smoke bud while you had food poisoning? And if you did how well did it work? I would like to compile some information on the effects of marijuana and food poisoning. It could eventually be a reason to get Medical Marijuana if it actually helps a lot.

 

In my opinion after learning about Sativex, it is definitely the safest choice for a Marijuana-Substitute because it is the only pill that is actually made directly from cannabis. The others develop cannabidiols from base ingredients, that's why they have to be considered a synthetic.

Sativex uses the cannabidiols directly found in Marijuana and GW is the first company to do that.

These numbers cannot be used as exact representations, but as more a ball park figure on the cost differences.

The numbers shown in here should be pretty close to the actual numbers.

But even with that being said, Sativex is still to expensive.
Medical Marijuana costs between $2.50 and $7.50 a day for most patients.
Marinol costs between $9 and $13.50 a day.
Sativex costs closely to $16 a day.

It may not seem like a big difference at first, but most people who are going to start taking these medicines will most likely be prescribed to the for the rest of their lives. Let's say a 20 year old male with a chronic sleeping disorder lives to be 80 years old, making his intake everyday for 60 years.

Let's say he picks Sativex, $16 a day, translating to $5840 a year that would means over his lifetime he would spend $350,400 dollars on Sativex

Another route, say he picks Marinol, the average price would be $11.25 a day, translating to $4,106 a year, that would make his lifetime spendings on Marinol $246,360.

Now, let's say he takes the best route. Medicinal Marijuana, the average price would be $5 a day, translating to $1825 a year and $109,500 for his lifetime.

Compared to Sativex, Marinol is $4.75 cheaper a day, $1,734 cheaper a year and $104,040 cheaper over a 60 year period of time.

Compared to Marinol, Marijuana is $6.25 cheaper a day, $2,285 cheaper a year and $142,320 cheaper over a 60 year period of time.


Marinol costs 70% less than Sativex.
Marijuana costs 225% less than Marinol.
Marijuana costs 312.5% less than Sativex.

Marijuana still remains the cheapest and most effective of the three, it's just not legal.

These numbers cannot be used as exact representations, but as more a ball park figure on the cost differences.

 

I don't want to sound like a nut, but trust me. The majority of people in government know how great of a drug marijuana is. They just cannot tax and regulate a naturally grown plant that can be grown virtually anywhere by virtually anyone. Just to quickly prove my point, take a look at these two products..

Tobacco​

Certainly more deadly than Marijuana, tobacco has zero health benefits and because of Nicotine, and addictive alkoloid tobacco has great chance of physical and psychological dependencies. Tobacco receives both a state tax and a federal excise tax before it gets in your hands.

Tobacco is produced by mainly by 5 major tobacco companies therefore it is easily regulated. Because it is easily regulated, the government can throw a hard excise tax which in 2009 equaled more than $8.5 billion (This amount not including state taxes). The companies produce the tobacco with industrial equipment at an industrial level and in every way it is more efficient than the way one man would produce tobacco.

1. Tobacco must be tended during most of the growth to make sure the crop does not get attacked by bugs or other things.
2.It is very hard for just one person to grow and harvest and dry.
3. All tobacco is aged for over a year as well. So you have to wait a long time before you can actually go from planting to smoking.
4. Growing Tobacco is really not worth it when you can immediately just go buy a pack cigarettes and have them right then without the waiting.

Alcohol​

Again, more deadly than Marijuana, Alcohol has zero health benefits and because of Ethanol, the main active ingredient in Alcohol is a Psychoactive chemical that blocks neurotransmitters. All alcohol that you buy is taxed at a state and federal level. Just in the year 2000, $3.6 Billion was collected for federal taxes and $1.9 Billion in state taxes.

1. The most profitable alcohol is in beer, which is mainly controlled by only a few companies. Therefore, regulation is easy.
2. Producing alcohol can be a very hard a strenuous task, if you do not have the equipment that is found in mega breweries owned by corporations.
3. Why would you go through the trouble of making your own alcohol when you can easily run to the store and pick some up, with the choice of numerous varieties?

Now take a look why the government is unable to tax or regulate bud.

Marijuana​

1. Marijuana from germination to harvest usually only takes 4 months.
2. Once the plant is matured the bud can be cut and immediately smoked.
3. Marijuana can be grown in numerous places. (Indoors and Outdoors)
4. As marijuana is not hard to grow or cultivate, all it needs is soil and water, it would be near impossible to try to regulate it in plant form.
5. The government is trying to figure out new ways everyday how they can tax and regulate marijuana.
6. It would also be near impossible for a main company to take over the marijuana business because so many people would be growing it.
7. Without main companies, the bud being produced would be untraceable and therefore, impossible to tax and regulate.
8. If marijuana was fully legalized, a lot of pharmaceutical companies would go under because their pills would be unnecessary. So the million dollar companies work together to keep Marijuana banned at Federal level

Because Marijuana is near impossible to regulate while it's in plant form, the government decided to help fund and create Marinol, a failed synthetic marijuana substitute. Then they immediately sold the rights to only Unimed Pharmaceuticals. Marinol was a FDA Orphan Drug for a long time so it was the only drug that could have marijuana properties and be legal in the United States with a prescription. Imagine how easy it would be to tax and regulate one business that's controlling all of the marijuana flow. Too bad at least 90% of people who tried Marinol and Medicinal Marijuana preferred the Medicinal Marijuana.

 

Thank you man, glad you enjoy them. I'll keep them coming as I find interesting topics that aren't widely discussed already.

 

I didn't really go into deep research about Sativex, the only thing I knew about it was that it was more expensive than a usual marijuana alternative and that it possesses more cannibidiols than a usual alternative. You are right it is a mouth spray which I have gone back and corrected. Thank you for your help.