TESTS BOOST MARIJUANA USE ON AIDS

The patients taking marijuana by smoking or in pill form saw the level of
HIV virus in their blood drop slightly more than those on the placebo.

DURBAN, South Africa -- The first U.S. study using medical marijuana for
people with HIV has found that smoking the plant does not disrupt the effect
of anti-retroviral drugs that keep the virus in check.

The results were announced today at the 13th International AIDS Conference
and are the first to be released from research, conducted at San Francisco
General Hospital, into the use of marijuana by people infected with HIV.

Given the scarcity of data about the possible medical uses of marijuana, the
results have been eagerly awaited by advocates in this heavily debated
issue.

It took four years for University of California San Francisco professor
Donald Abrams to jump through hurdles erected by the federal government to
get the research under way, and in the process he was restricted to focusing
on marijuana's safety rather than its effectiveness.

"The fact of the matter is that any good clinician with his eyes and ears
open has known for a long time that cannabis is very useful in the treatment
of the AIDS reduction syndrome and does not harm patients," said Dr. Lester
Greenspoon, professor of psychiatry at Harvard University and author of
"Marijuana: the Forbidden Medicine."

"When all the dust settles, and when marijuana is admitted to the U.S.
pharmacopia, it will be seen as one of the least toxic drugs in the whole
compendium. What Don (Abrams) has done is put the seal of approval on a new
drug with his double blind study."

Researchers were keen to study people on drug regimes that contain protease
inhibitors, because the key ingredient in marijuana is metabolized by the
same system in the liver as those drugs.

The 67 participants were divided into three groups, one smoking marijuana,
one taking an FDA-approved pill containing marijuana's main ingredient, the
third taking a placebo. In all groups, tests showed the level of virus in
the blood dropped or remained undetectable. Those on marijuana either by
smoking or in pill form saw their level drop more than those on the placebo.