- Legal ‘electronic joint’ developed to help ailments eased by cannabis
- It will help calm, relax and ease people’s pain, but will not give a ‘high’
- This is because it contains cannabidiol (CBD) which acts as a painkiller
- Does not contain psychoactive ingredient THC which gives a ‘high’
- Product will be available to patients in France from January 2015
PUBLISHED: 12:28 EST, 16 December 2014
A legal ‘electronic joint’ to help patients with conditions that are eased by cannabis will go on sale in France next month.
The firm behind the e-joint, called KanaVape, claims it will provide all the relaxing and pain-killing effects of marijuana, without the high.
The product has been engineered to contain cannabidiol (CBD), a compound in cannabis which has therapeutic uses as a painkiller.
But, crucially, the product does not contain THC, another psychoactive compound found in cannabis, which causes the ‘high’.
An ‘electronic joint’ made from hemp plants is being developed by a French manufacturer. It claims the e-joint, called KanaVape, will provide all the relaxing and painkilling effects of marijuana, without the high, as it does not contain the psychoactive ingredient THC
‘KanaVape brings you many of the benefits of cannabinoids without the psychotic effect of THC’, its makers claim, writing on their website.
Cannabis-derived drugs such as Sativex are already used in the U.S., UK and other European countries to treat the pain associated with multiple sclerosis and cancer.
Two other cannabis-derived drugs, Cesamet and Marinol, are also used in Canada and the U.S. to treat the nausea and vomiting associated with chemotherapy and AIDS-related anorexia.
The founders of KanaVape, Antonin Cohen, a start up entrepreneur and Sebastian Beguerie, an agricultural engineer, spent two years extracting legal cannabinoids and developing the product, VICE News reports.
It is made from the hemp version of the plant, grown legally in France, which contains more CBD and only 0.2 per cent THC, which is not enough for recreational users of cannabis.
Mr Cohen, who previously worked in start-up companies in the U.S. where he said it was possible to earn a ‘comfortable salary’, said he quit his job and set up KanaVape as he wanted to help people suffering conditions that could be eased by marijuana.
He realised many people in France suffer from cancer or MS, and said it was an ‘injustice’ they could not use cannabis to ease their pain.
He said: ‘One of them said “Cannabis plant helps me to fight against my illness, however, the legislation that I have to put myself in situations of illegality. I therefore cannot provide myself with cannabis legally, I cannot find quality cannabis.”
‘We sell this product in France for the sick, a harmless molecule is sued and cannot be accused of marketing a product for recreational use. There is no high in it.’
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