06 January 08 - 20:39
Cannabis reverses brain damage from alcohol
Alcohol treatment group ARBIAS stated: “2 million Australians are at risk of permanent brain damage from heavy drinking (ethanol drug abuse), while more than 200,000 are living with the condition undiagnosed”.
ALCOHOL is the world’s most widely used psycho-active drug, but chronic, excessive alcohol consumption (drug abuse) leads to permanent organ damage and death. Alcohol induced brain damage produces some of the most insidious effects of alcoholism, including cognitive deficits such as learning and memory impairment….. Ethanol may also injure the brain by increasing oxidative stress.
Rats were fed 9-12 grams per kg per day of the drug ethanol/alcohol for a 4-day binge. At the end of the experiment, brain slices prepared from ethanol treated rats showed a significant loss of neurons throughout the hippocampal cortical circuits of the brain. The most affected regions included the olfactory bulb and dentate gyrus granular cell layer, as well as perirhinal, piriform, and entorhinal cortices. (Put simply - alcohol drug induced neuro-logical brain damage).
When 40mg/kg of CBD/Cannabidiol was co-administered with ethanol on days 2 to 4 of the protocol, alcohol cell death was reduced by approx. 60% in both hippocampal granular cells and the entorhinal cortical pyramidal cells.
CBD/Cannabidiol, a non-psychoactive component of cannabis, substantially limits neuronal damage. CBD has been shown to prevent damage associated with glutamate toxicity in cortical neuron cultures and to have antioxidant properties.
We compared the neuro-protective effects of CBD/ Cannabidiol with two other common antioxidants, TOC and BHT. All three compounds reduced more than 50% of the argyrophilia (nerve cell death) after binge ethanol treatment in brain regions that were examined. This showed that anti-oxidants prevent the cell death associated with binge ethanol consumption.
http://intramural.nimh.nih.gov/lcmr/smn/pdf/15878999.pdf
(Dr. Aidan Hampson).
TOC = Tocopherol - Vitamin E
BHT = Butylated Hydroxy toluene (manmade)
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