SAY AAAHH: POT SPRAY ON WAY FOR MS PATIENTS

Health Canada Approved Pain Treatment on Friday

A mouth spray made from marijuana could be available in Canada by the
end of spring, making it the first pot-based pharmaceutical legally
available for sale in the world.

Approved by Health Canada on Friday, Sativex is a spray made of
pulverized pot plants, used to treat pain symptoms in multiple
sclerosis (MS) patients.

"It's the first cannabis-derived pharmaceutical product approved
anywhere in the world," said a spokesperson for Bayer Inc., its
distributor here.

Though Health Canada has asked for more "confirmatory studies" from
the manufacturer, approval for Sativex was expedited to fill what the
agency describes as an unmet medical need.

No treatments currently exist to treat the pain suffered by MS
patients. They take everything from over-the-counter aspirin to
morphine in often futile attempts to quell their discomfort.

Sprayed into the absorbent red tissue on the inside of a patient's
mouth, Sativex is "a bit like a breath freshener" and tastes like a
"rather bitter Guinness," said Mark Rogerson, spokesperson for the
drug's manufacturer, British-based GW Pharmaceuticals.

Most patients start with a single spritz every four hours, about five
times a day. Each dose releases a tincture made of
tetrahydrocannabinol, the potent principal ingredient in marijuana,
and cannabidiol, its mellower counterpart.

Together, they produce an effect that numbs pain affecting the nervous
system without numbing a patient's brain as well. "It is absolutely
not necessary to become intoxicated in order to get pain relief,"
Rogerson said.

Intoxication, or getting high, can be a major deterrent for patients
who would otherwise benefit from pot's pain-relieving properties. MS
sufferers named it as a main reason for not using cannabis in a 2003
study published in the Canadian Journal of Neurological Studies.

"I have to take care of myself, and being stoned and forgetting stuff
can't be part of my life," one respondent said.

Canada's liberal approach to marijuana as a medicine made it a logical
marketplace for Sativex, which is still in the approval process in
Britain.

It will only be introduced to U.S. regulators at the end of the year,
long after approximately 25,000 MS patients in Canada are given the
treatment option by their doctors.

"When we were talking to Health Canada we found that we were talking
to people who were on the same wavelength as us," said Rogerson.

Manufacturers predict Sativex will be available, by prescription, in
drugstores by the end of June. The price for a 50-dose bottle is still
being determined.