UK halts CBD sales

Last Monday, the producers and distributors of cannabidiol CBD businesses in the United Kingdom have begun receiving letters from the Medicines and Healthcare products Regulatory Agency (MHRA) instructing them to stop selling, supplying, promoting, advertising, or ordering CBD products within 28 days. The letters also stated that CBD now meets the definition of a medical product. This revision of the definition will leave British patients without legal access to CBD.

MHRA representatives are expected to issue a statement today to clarify this position.

Peter Carroll, from the campaign End Our Pain, a British patient advocacy group that campaigns for medical cannabis, stated that «it understands the need to impose controls on the CBD market to protect people from unscrupulous suppliers and to ensure that people fully understand what they are taking.» But it added that it «fears this sudden move will cause enormous distress to people who rely on these products. It will drive many people to seek out CBD on the black market.».

The decision complicates the status of medical cannabis in the United Kingdom. The classification of CBD—one of the main active compounds in cannabis—as a medical product conflicts with the 2001 regulatory law (Misuse of Drugs Regulations) which classifies cannabis as having «no medical value.» This adds a new exception to the 2001 law; the first exception was Sativex, which is available—subject to numerous restrictions—to people with multiple sclerosis.

CBD has skyrocketed in popularity recently. Consumers use it in various forms, whether to relax, quit nicotine, or for a wide range of medical treatments. The CBD is associated with a number of medical applications with strong evidence of its effectiveness in treating epilepsy, anxiety, depression, and multiple sclerosis, among other conditions.

GW Pharmaceuticals, the manufacturer of Sativex, has recently published the results of clinical trials Phase III trial of Epidiolex, a liquid formulation of CBD. The company hopes to quickly obtain marketing authorization in Europe to treat severe forms of epilepsy, such as Dravet syndrome and Lennox-Gastaut syndrome.

It is still unclear whether current CBD sellers will be able to obtain a license to sell CBD. Medical products must meet certain standards before they can be sold, a process that generally takes years.

Many concerns have been raised about the unregulated CBD market. Until now, companies could sell CBD as long as they made no medical claims about the product. Some companies blithely ignored this restriction or supplied products of dubious origin and quality. The implementation of new rules will likely be welcomed by the industry, which is primarily concerned about whether it will ever be able to sell CBD again—and how soon.

The short 28-day deadline is likely to prompt people who need CBD to stock up. But it’s clear that the timing isn’t in the patients’ best interest.

Via Leafly