Diluted Cannabis oils in Argentina demonstrate the risks of buying CBD online, the solution could lie with companies like West Coast Ventures Corp. (WCVC) and their Illegal Brands CBD offering at physical restaurant locations.
There is a problem in the state of Argentina. Seven out of ten samples of cannabis oil that arrives at the laboratory of the Faculty of Biochemical Sciences of the National University of Rosario has a low cannabinoid content. This compound is what generates the therapeutic effects of CBD oils low content makes them ineffective.
This problem is prevalent globally and the study in Argentina highlights the risks of purchasing CBD online, or from unknown retailers. This is where companies like West Coast Ventures Corp. (WCVC) step in. The company is America’s first CBD restaurant stock and is dedicated to normalizing the use of CBD through education and high quality products.
All of the company’s Illegal Burger and Illegal Pizza restaurant locations stock Illegal Brands CBD sachets & water. The company takes the same approach to its CBD as it does to its food. Only high quality, sustainable products are utilized. This educational brick and mortar approach could help mitigate the threat posed by low quality, heavily diluted, CBD products sold online.
A serious problem for patients & health conscious users
The GC/MS (Gas Chromatography with Mass Spectrometry) laboratory of the Faculty of Biochemical and Pharmaceutical Sciences of the National University of Rosario (UNR) began to receive preparations from patients with low cannabinoid content. Seven out of ten samples of cannabis oil that arrive at this laboratory have a low content of cannabinoids, the compounds that generate therapeutic effects.
The presence of extremely diluted oils had already been detected by biochemists at the GC/MS (Gas Chromatography with Mass Spectrometry) laboratory of the Faculty of Biochemical and Pharmaceutical Sciences of the National University of Rosario (UNR). However the problem become worse over the course of 2019 as more patients sent in samples of the products that they consume to treat illnesses like rheumatism, arthritis and other types of pain; generally without any other medical accompaniment.
Last February, the Faculty of Biochemistry begin to offer to analyze cannabis oil for medicinal use with the aim of bringing key information to the community guaranteeing the right to know what is consumed. The information provided by this analysis is unique in Argentina.
The faculty was already experienced in conducting these tests. Two years ago, through a UNR linkage project, trials were started with the purpose of understanding what type of oils the population consumed and to make a pharmacotherapeutic follow-up of the patients. The samples arrived only through the Pharmacotherapy Optimization Unit (UOF) and cannabis organizations.
The analyses offered are confidential, only identified with a code, and the results are received by mail. Users of the service can voluntarily complete an anonymous questionnaire that asks if the oil was acquired in the formal or informal market, if it is of national, international or home-produced origin; if the plant used or the way of extraction is known and, finally, the ailment for which it is consumed, if it is part of a medical treatment regime and how many drops they take per day.
The service processes an average of 40 samples per month, mostly from the illicit market. The test determines the concentration of two important cannabinoids: CDB (with a significant medicinal benefit) and THC (more psychoactive). The level of CBD or THC in a product determines whether the oil is therapeutic, or merely a placebo.
“A plant has a variation in its content and concentration depending on its genetics, according to where it is cultivated and in what way, the climate -whether there was sun or rain-; then the procedure of extraction, harvesting, manipulation and elaboration of the oil (the preparation and if it was diluted)” explained the biochemist Mónica Hourcade, chief and responsible for the service. “They are all determining conditions, so the same grower can have different results over and over again. And when he prepares the sample to be sent to this laboratory, that protocol also has an impact on the result of the analysis.”
The Results
“The experience of these months allows us to draw two conclusions: we see many samples with very low concentrations, much more than those we saw in the oils brought to us by the growers’ organisations. The samples that circulate commercially on the black market, in general, are quite diluted. And we also see that there are many people who consume the oils and do not have any advice or supervision from the doctor” explained the Dean of the Faculty of Biochemistry, Esteban Serra.
Of the samples received at the faculty since the service opened, 70 percent showed they had less than one milligram of either of the two cannabinoids per milliliter of oil. Two years ago the percentage of oils with low cannabinoid content was 40 percent. One milligram per milliliter is a low percentage. In general, oils are more concentrated. Those produced in Chile, for example, have four milligrams (3 of CBD and 1 of THC), and Charlotte’s Web oil has 50 milligrams of CBD.
If the studies in Argentina demonstrate anything it is that the regulations surrounding CBD oils are still severely lacking. Users shouldn’t purchase oil from unknown brands, no matter how good the deal seems. Instead they should look to companies like Charlotte’s Web and West Coast Ventures Corp. for a legitimate product.