Cannabis effective in treating different cancers.

Source: ABC News October 18 2009by

Dave Stancliff

Marijuana proven effective in treating different types of cancers

Marijuana opponents in the federal government are up against the wall and the wall is crumbling. The feds have fought marijuana use fordecades, disregarding its medicinal applications, in a senseless waragainst the herb.The demonized killer weed is turning out to be anything but that. Asmyths about this ancient herb are dispelled, scientists are using itto treat everything from chemotherapy-induced nausea to differentcancers.In August, The British Journal of Cancer published the results of astudy that found THC (the main active component in marijuana) iseffective in fighting prostate cancer. Reportedly, pot attacksprostate cancer cell types that do not respond to the usual hormonetreatments.A recent study by a team of Spanish researchers discovered THC killsvarious brain cancer cells by a process known as autophagy. Michigan'snew law regarding marijuana use went into effect in April. Patients,with doctor's prescriptions, get a state-issued ID Card (a lot likeCalifornia's) which allows them to grow and use marijuana to treatpain and other symptoms of cancer and multiple sclerosis.In October 2003, the University of California, San Francisco,released the results of a study that said pot was effective when usedin combination with opiate pain medications. Dr. Donald Abrams, MD,UCSF professor of Clinical Medicine and chief of theHematology-Oncology Division at SF General Hospital Medical Center,told the press, “Marijuana uses a different mechanism than opiatesand could augment the pain relief of opiate analgesics.”The Marijuana Policy Project recently reported on a study thatsuggests moderate amounts of marijuana use reduces risk of head andneck squamous cell carcinoma (HNSCC). This study suggests cannabinoidshave potential anti-tumor properties.A study released in July, “White matter in adolescents with historyof marijuana use and binge drinking,” says marijuana use actuallyprotects brain cells. The study involved adolescents with alcohol usedisorders.One group had just alcohol-drinking teens. The other group drankalcohol and used marijuana. The report said that binge drinkers whoused marijuana retained more white matter than the other group. Inother words, alcohol destroyed more brain cells when a person didn'tuse marijuana.How many times have you heard someone say, “Pot destroys your braincells”? If that's true, what about this study? Why do doctors usemarijuana to fight brain cancer if it destroys brain cells? Rememberthe Spanish study?In April of 2007, Harvard University researchers released the resultsof a study that concluded THC cuts tumor growth in common lung cancersand reduces the ability of the cancer to spread.A study conducted by UCLA's medical school in June 2005 concludedsmoking marijuana did not cause lung cancer. That impressive piece ofnews, along with the Harvard study, seems to have been ignored by mostmass media outlets.Fred Gardner, editor of the medical marijuana research journal,O'Shaughnessy's, recently wrote an article, “Smoking Marijuana DoesNot Cause Cancer,” about this groundbreaking UCLA study that barelymade headlines.Gardner reported that an investigative team was contracted with theNational Institute on Drug Abuse (NIDA) in 2002 “to conduct a large,population-based, case-controlled study that would prove definitivelythat heavy, long-term marijuana use increases the risk of lung andupper-airway cancers.”Guess what? This study backfired! It turned out that increasedmarijuana use did not result in higher rates of lung and pharyngealcancer. The study also concluded that tobacco smokers who also puffedon pot were at a slightly lower risk of getting lung cancer than thosewho didn't!Perhaps the icing on the cake is the fact that UCLA Medical professorDonald Tashkin led the investigation. Tashkin has led governmentstudies on marijuana since the 1970s and is well known for his beliefthat heavy marijuana use causes lung and upper-airway cancers. To hiscredit as a professional, he ended up disproving his own originalhypothesis.Despite the government's efforts to keep it illegal, it's apparentthat marijuana does offer help in the battle to treat cancer. Thefacts about marijuana's medical potentials are finally causing cracksin the government's wall of lies built up over the years.As It Stands, it's time to bring down that wall.Dave Stancliff is a columnist for The Times-Standard. He is a formernewspaper editor and publisher. Comments can be sent torichstan1@suddenlink.net <mailto:richstan1@suddenlink.net> or www.davesblogcentral.com <http://www.davesblogcentral.com/>http://www.times-standard.com/othervoices/ci_13588713--If you do not want to receive any more newsletters, http://www.lca-uk.org/lists/?p=unsubscribe&uid=dd7fc5f7e9918311b5e63b09a52b6921To update your preferences and to unsubscribe visithttp://www.lca-uk.org/lists/?p=preferences&uid=dd7fc5f7e9918311b5e63b09a52b6921Forward a Message to Someonehttp://www.lca-uk.org/lists/?p=forward&uid=dd7fc5f7e9918311b5e63b09a52b6921&mid=46--Powered by PHPlist, www.phplist.com --

LBBDSocialandUrbanReality

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From the Transform blog:-"

Latest Housing news, jobs, analysis and opinion - Regen.net

Latest Housing news, jobs, analysis and opinion - Regen.net: "2012 village raids contingency fund
The Government has been forced to use £95m from its Olympic contingency budget to progress work on the Olympic village, it emerged this week."

Latest Housing news, jobs, analysis and opinion - Regen.net

Latest Housing news, jobs, analysis and opinion - Regen.net: "2012 village raids contingency fund
The Government has been forced to use £95m from its Olympic contingency budget to progress work on the Olympic village, it emerged this week."

Data mapping – measuring equality at a local level

Data mapping – measuring equality at a local level

Safeguarding our cyber borders.

Posted on Wednesday, 10.08.08

Safeguarding our cyber borders
BY MELISSA HATHAWAY
www.staysafeonline.org
London shoppers who bought groceries with bankcards over the last two years paid a higher price than they bargained for.
Cyber thieves had implanted unauthorized circuitry in keypads sold to supermarkets in the Barking and Dagenham area of the British capital. The corrupted keypads were then used to capture account information and Personal Identification Numbers (PINs). The data were siphoned off and used to skim from or in some cases empty shoppers' bank accounts.
The thieves covered their tracks by encrypting the numbers they stole, then storing them on a computer server abroad. It took more than a year for the authorities to catch on.
Stories such as that aren't only sobering news for consumers. For folks charged with securing and protecting the nation's defense and intelligence infrastructure, however, increasingly sophisticated cyber assaults are a chilling -- and increasingly familiar -- challenge.
The same devices that thieves use to sneak into bank accounts, the same techniques that hackers use to disrupt Internet service or alter a digital profile, are being used by foreign military and spy services to besiege information systems that are vital to our nation's defense.
Because defense and other national security contractors share data and
systems with their government partners, an attack on one can be an attack on many. Plans are only as secure as the weakest link in the information chain. These days, those links are being tested as never before.
The attackers' goals fall into three categories:

• Information theft. Stealing data from a target personal device, system or network is the most common threat. For example, a disgruntled Boeing employee was charged last year with lifting more than 320,000 sensitive company files by using a thumb drive to tap the corporate system. Boeing estimated that the stolen documents would have cost it between $5 billion and $15 billion in lost revenue had they been given to competitors.

• Information disruption. Hackers who sneak into government systems and alter crucial operating data are a growing concern. In 2006, a disgruntled Navy contractor inserted malicious code into five computers at the Navy's European Planning and Operations Command in Naples, Italy. Two computers were rendered inoperable when the program was executed. Had the other three computers been knocked offline, the network that tracks U.S. and NATO ships in the Mediterranean Sea and helps prevent military and commercial vessels from colliding would have been shut down.

• Information denial. Cases in which private or government computer systems are shut down by floods of automated hits are also on the rise. In April 2007, Russian nationalists used such a ''distributed denial of service'' attack to block access to the networks of the Estonian parliament, the president's office and many of that country's banks, news organizations and Internet service providers.

The ''What Ifs'' are an even greater concern. Could an adversary insert erroneous data that would cause weapons, early warning systems and other elements of national security to fail at critical times? What if financial or medical records were altered, or rail or air traffic control systems were corrupted? What if malicious code were secretly installed during the manufacture or shipping of computer equipment, to be activated at some future date? How would we even know what threats we face?

Defensive measures are being taken. In January, President Bush proposed a 12-point Comprehensive National Cybersecurity Initiative whose solutions range from a public awareness campaign to sophisticated new systems for identifying and deterring intrusions. Congress approved funding in late September.

A key element of the plan -- reducing the number of access points between federal agencies and external computer networks -- is under way. The federal government has closed about 3,500 such access points this year, leaving about 1,000 still open. The goal is to reduce the final number to fewer than 100.

Much more needs to be done, however.
We need stronger international alliances to share the responsibility for securing cyberspace. We must do more to convince our allies and strategic partners of the benefits to them of taking an active role.
We also need a fundamental re-thinking of our government's traditional relationship with the private sector. A high percentage of our critical information infrastructure is privately owned, and industry needs to know what government knows about our adversaries' targets and, to the extent we understand them, their methods of operation.

When it comes to cyber security, government and the private sector need to recognize that an individual vulnerability is a common weakness.
There's time, though not unlimited time, to get the job done. We must make a continuing public commitment to securing cyber space -- and we must do so now.

Melissa Hathaway is the cyber coordination executive for the director of national intelligence. The Department of Homeland Security has designated October National Cyber Security Awareness Month.
c. 2008, McClatchy-Tribune Information Services

Google News - Dagenham, England, UK

Google News - Dagenham, England, UK