When parents like the Figi's find Dharmanol. The p
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Ironic an optician can see when others in more credentialed areas of health and medicine are either blind or refuse to see.
"The recovery of Charlotte and other kids has inspired the Figis and others to travel the country, pushing for medical marijuana laws or statutes that would allow high-CBD, low-THC pot strains."
"Ray Mirazabegian, an optician in Glendale, Calif., brought Charlotte's Web to his state, where medical marijuana is legal. He convinced the Stanley brothers to give him some seeds he could use to treat his 9-year-old daughter Emily, who spent her days slumped on the couch. Now, she's running, jumping and talking. Mirazabegian is cloning the Charlotte's Web seeds and has opened the California branch of the Stanleys' foundation."
Mirazabegian has begun to distribute the strain to 25 families and has a waitlist of 400. It includes, he said, families willing to move from Japan and the Philippines.
From a CBS report
Feb. 7, 2014.
For many, Charlotte's story was something they couldn't ignore.
Charlotte is a twin, but her sister, Chase, doesn't have Dravet's syndrome, which kills kids before they reach adulthood.
In early 2012, it seemed Charlotte would be added to that grim roster: Her vital signs flat-lined three times, leading her parents to begin preparing for her death. They even signed an order for doctors not to take heroic measures to save her life again should she go into cardiac arrest.
Her father, Matt started looking online for ways to help his daughter and thought they should give pot a try. But there was a danger: The psychoactive ingredient, THC, can trigger seizures.
The plant also contains another chemical known as cannabidiol (CBD) that may have seizure-fighting properties. In October, the Food and Drug Administration approved testing a British pharmaceutical firm's marijuana-derived drug that is CBD-based and has all its THC removed.
Few dispensaries stock CBD-heavy weed that doesn't get you high. Then Paige Figi found Joel Stanley, who along with four of his brothers, had found themselves in the medical marijuana business after moving to Colorado. Almost as an experiment, they bred a low-THC, high-CBD plant after hearing it could fight tumors.
Stanley went to the Figis' house with reservations about giving pot to a child.
"But she had done her homework," Stanley said of Paige Figi.
Now, Stanley and his brothers provide the marijuana to nearly 300 patients and have a waitlist of 2,000.
The CBD is extracted by a chemist who once worked for drug giant Pfizer, mixed with olive oil so it can be ingested through the mouth or the feeding tube that many sufferers from childhood epilepsy use, then sent to a third-party lab to test its purity.
Charlotte takes the medication twice a day. "A year ago, she could only say one word," her father said. "Now she says complete sentences."
The recovery of Charlotte and other kids has inspired the Figis and others to travel the country, pushing for medical marijuana laws or statutes that would allow high-CBD, low-THC pot strains.
Donald Burger recently urged a New York state legislative panel to legalize medical marijuana while his wife, Aileen, was in the family's new rental house in Colorado Springs, giving Charlotte's Web to their daughter Elizabeth, 4. The family only relocated to Colorado after neurologists told them Elizabeth's best hope -- brain surgery -- could only stop some of her seizures.
"It's a very big strain being away from the rest of our family," Aileen Burger said recently while waiting for her husband to return from a trip to sell their Long Island house. "But she doesn't have to have pieces of her brain removed."
Ray Mirazabegian, an optician in Glendale, Calif., brought Charlotte's Web to his state, where medical marijuana is legal. He convinced the Stanley brothers to give him some seeds he could use to treat his 9-year-old daughter Emily, who spent her days slumped on the couch. Now, she's running, jumping and talking. Mirazabegian is cloning the Charlotte's Web seeds and has opened the California branch of the Stanleys' foundation.
Mirazabegian has begun to distribute the strain to 25 families and has a waitlist of 400. It includes, he said, families willing to move from Japan and the Philippines.
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