1. Cannabis

2. What is Cannabis
Family: Cannabaceae
Species: sativa, indica, ruderalis
COMMON NAMES: Marijuana, Pot, Weed, Ganja, Mary Jane
EFFECTS: Intoxicant, Stimulant, Psychedelic, Depressant
DESCRIPTION: Cannabis, a fast-growing bushy annual with dense sticky flowers,
produces the psychoactive THC. It is the most widely used illegal psychoactive and has
a long history of medicinal, recreational, and industrial use. The fibrous stalks of the
plant are used to produce clothing and rope but that is usually in reference to hemp.
Cannabis is the scientific name for a herb that produces a psychotropic cannabinoid
called THC along with an array of cannabinoids. It is the only plant in the world to
produce these chemicals, usually produced in humans and animals.

3. Uses
Cannabis sativa which is the larger species of cannabis, also known as hemp can be
used for many things including
Food and Nutrition
Hempseeds and hemp oil are highly nutritious and delicious. Hempseeds are an
excellent source of protein, minerals, and dietary fibre. Hemp is the only plant that
contains all of the essential fatty acids and amino acids required by the human body.,
Paper
Hemp is an ideal material for making paper. It regenerates in the field in months (unlike
trees which can take 30 years or more to become harvestable after planting.),
Plastic
Most plastic is made from fossil fuels using toxic chemicals. Almost everything we buy is
wrapped in cellophane and our landfills are full of it. A variety of alternatives to plastic
can be made from hemp,
Building Materials
Hemp based materials can replace wood and other materials used to build homes and
other buildings including foundations, walls, shingles, paneling, pipes, and paint,
Fuel, drugs, Fabric, Textiles, and Rope

4. History
Cannabis is indigenous to Central and South Asia. Evidence of the inhalation of cannabis
smoke can be found in the 3rd millennium BCE, as indicated by charred cannabis seeds
found in a ritual brazier at an ancient burial site in present day Romania.
Cannabis was also known to the ancient Assyrians, who discovered its psychoactive
properties through the Aryans. Using it in some religious ceremonies, they called it
qunubu (meaning "way to produce smoke"), a probable origin of the modern word
"cannabis". Cannabis was also introduced by the Aryans to the Scythians, Thracians and
Dacians, whose shamans (the kapnobatai—"those who walk on smoke/clouds") burned
cannabis flowers to induce a state of trance.
Cannabis has an ancient history of ritual use and is found in pharmacological cults
around the world. Hemp seeds discovered by archaeologists at Pazyryk suggest early
ceremonial practices like eating by the Scythians occurred during the 5th to 2nd century
BCE, confirming previous historical reports by Herodotus. One writer has claimed that
cannabis was used as a religious sacrament by ancient Jews and early Christiansdue to
the similarity between the Hebrew word "qannabbos" ("cannabis") and the Hebrew
phrase "qené bósem" ("aromatic cane"). It was used by Muslims in various Sufi orders
as early as the Mamluk period.
A study published in the South African Journal of Science showed that "pipes dug up
from the garden of Shakespeare's home in Stratford-upon-Avon contain traces of
cannabis. The chemical analysis was carried out after researchers hypothesized that the
"noted weed" mentioned in Sonnet 76 and the "journey in my head" from Sonnet 27
could be references to cannabis and the use thereof.
Cannabis was criminalized in various countries beginning in the early 20th century. In
the United States, the first restrictions for sale of cannabis came in 1906. It was
outlawed in South Africa in 1911, in Jamaica (then a British colony) in 1913 and in the

5. United Kingdom and New Zealand in the 1920s. Canada criminalized cannabis in the
Opium and Drug Act of 1923, before any reports of use of the drug in Canada.
In 1937 in the United States, the Marihuana Tax Act was passed, and prohibited the
production of hemp in addition to cannabis. The reasons that hemp was also included in
this law are disputed. Some scholars believe the Act was passed in order to destroy the
hemp industry, largely as an effort of businessmen Andrew Mellon, Randolph Hearst,
and the Du Pont family. Hemp became a very cheap substitute for the paper pulp that
was used in the newspaper industry. Hearst felt that this was a threat to his extensive
timber holdings. Mellon, Secretary of the Treasury and the wealthiest man in America,
had invested heavily in the DuPont's new synthetic fiber, nylon, and considered its
success to depend on its replacement of the traditional resource, hemp.
(Chinese character "ma" for hemp.)

6. Cannabis a drug?
Medical uses-
Cannabis used medically has several documented beneficial effects including;
prevention of nausea and vomiting, stimulation of hunger in chemotherapy and AIDS
patients, lowered intraocular eye pressure (effective for treating glaucoma), as well as
general analgesic effects (pain reliever)
Less confirmed individual studies also have been conducted indicating cannabis to be
beneficial to a gamut of conditions running from multiple sclerosis to depression.
Synthesized cannabinoids are also sold as prescription drugs, including Marinol and
Cesamet
recreational drug-
Cannabis has psychoactive and physiological effects when consumed. The minimum
amount of THC required to have a perceptible psychoactive effect is about 10
micrograms per kilogram of body weight. The most common short-term physical and
neurological effects include increased heart rate, lowered blood pressure, impairment of
short-term and working memory, psychomotor coordination, and concentration. Long-
term effects are less clear.
Overdose from cannabis is extremely rare. Due to the fact that it takes 40,000 times
the amount of THC required to intoxicate someone, to kill them. Compared to alcohol, it
only takes about 5 to 10 times the amount of alcohol required to intoxicate, to be fatal.
For example, if it requires 3 beers to intoxicate you, it only requires 15 to 30 beers to
kill you. However, if it takes you 3 'hits' of marijuana to intoxicate you, it would require
120,000 hits to kill you. Thus, it is basically impossible to die of a marijuana overdose
(you would probably die from lack of oxygen first).
Psychoactive effects:
Most psychoactive drugs fall into the category of stimulant, depressant, or hallucinogen,
cannabis exhibits a mix of all properties, though mostly hallucinogenic or psychedelic.
Cannabis is ranked one of the least harmful drugs by a study published in the UK
medical journal, The Lancet.

7. Forms:
Unprocessed- Dried Cannabis
The terms cannabis or marijuana usually refer to the dried flowers, leaves and stems of
the female cannabis plant. This is the most commonly consumed form, containing 3%
to 22% THC. In contrast, cannabis varieties used to produce industrial hemp contain
less than 1% THC and are thus not valued for recreational use.
Processed-
Kief is a powder, rich in trichomes, which can be sifted from the leaves and flowers of
cannabis plants and either consumed in powder form or compressed to produce cakes
of hashish.
Hashish- (or hash) is a concentrated resin produced from the flowers of the female
cannabis plant. Hash can often be more potent than marijuana. It varies in color from
black to golden brown depending upon purity.

8. Hash oil
Hash oil is a mix of essential oils and resins extracted from mature cannabis plant. It
has a high proportion of cannabinoids (ranging from 40 to 90%).and is used in a variety
of cannabis foods.
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