Browsing: CBD

Cannabidiol enthusiasm is reaching a fever pitch in Colorado. Consumers snarf CBD down in doughnuts, slurp it up with CBD-infused lattes, lather it on with lotions, gulp it down in capsules and, of course, puff it the old-fashioned way with high-CBD pot strains. But while the CBD craze consumes Colorado, CBD remains illegal in many American markets, since it is still labeled by the DEA’s Schedule I as having “no currently accepted medical use and a high potential for abuse.”

But there is a loophole: for CBD that is not derived from cannabis. And the Peak Health Foundation took advantage of that loophole to create Real Scientific Humulus Oil (RHSO-K), a CBD oil derived from the kriya brand humulus plant. Because that plant is a variety of hop, not cannabis, the oil is legal in this country.

CBD products are touted for their healing properties. But even they would have a hard time mending the rift that’s torn apart a Colorado CBD company, which has dissolved amid dueling lawsuits, with one alleging a scheme to funnel more than $1 million to an animal sanctuary in Costa Rica and the other focusing on $300,000 in missing meds and a series of accused co-conspirators, one of whom is named Natalia Swindler.

At the center of this drama is John Merritt, the man behind Full Spectrum Nutrition Inc., a Colorado Springs operation that’s currently in limbo.

The industrial-hemp industry may have gotten a nod of approval from the Drug Enforcement Administration in late May, when the agency clarified that not all compounds of cannabis fall under the Controlled Substances Act. Referencing a 2004 decision by the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals that excluded non-psychoactive cannabinoids from the federal government’s definition of marijuana, the announcement came after the DEA says it had received numerous inquiries on the matter.

The state’s hemp industry, which produces the majority of cannabidiol (CBD) products in Colorado, are worried about the consequences of a bill the General Assembly has approved that opens the door for CBD medicine approved by the United States Food and Drug Administration.

Colorado lawmakers wanted to be ahead of the curve with HB 1187, introduced by State Representative Janet Buckner, to allow a pharmaceutical drug made from CBD that is expected to receive FDA approval within the next couple of months to be sold in Colorado. That drug, Epidiolex, is made by an American subsidiary of British GW Pharmaceuticals for treating epilepsy.

Michelle Walker moved her family to Colorado from Texas in 2017 looking for relief for her son, who suffers from severe autism spectrum disorder (ASD) and epileptic seizures — and she found it. Walker says that her ten-year-old boy, Vincent Zuniga, has made astonishing progress since they moved to Colorado in order to get access to medical marijuana. As a result, they’ve been able to visit Rocky Mountain National Park, Coors Field and other public places they wouldn’t have dreamed of going to before Vincent’s new medication.

“We could never do these things without medical cannabis,” Walker explains. “It allows us to live this quality of life the best we can.” Because of his seizures — one of the nine qualifying medical conditions for cannabis in Colorado — Vincent qualified for a medical marijuana card; as a result, Walker is able to give her son high-CBD cannabis medication. According to the Epilepsy Foundation, approximately one-third of those suffering from ASD also have epilepsy.

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