US Food and Drug Administration recommend approval of cannabis-based drug

An advisory panel for the US Food and Drug Administration has unanimously recommended approval of an epilepsy medication made with an ingredient found in marijuana.

The drug called Epidiolex is made by a British company called GW Pharmaceuticals. If it is approved it would be the first cannabis-derived prescription medicine available in the US.

Epidiolex’s active ingredient is cannabidiol, a chemical compound which is also found in cannabis.

It would be used to treat two rare forms of epilepsy Lennox-Gastaut syndrome and Dravet syndrome. They are among the most difficult types of epilepsy to treat.

It differs from medical marijuana allowed in some US states to treat terminal illnesses as does not not affect people's behaviour.

Advocates for the use of marijuana for medical use and those pushing for better treatments of epilepsy said they were pleased with the panel’s recommendation.

“This is a very good development, and it basically underscores that there are medicinal properties to some of the cannabinoids,” Dr. Igor Grant, director of the Center for Medicinal Cannabis Research at the University of California San Diego told the New York Times.

“I think there could well be other cannabinoids that are of therapeutic use, but there is just not enough research on them to say.”

There are currently an estimated 30,000 children and adults living with Lennox-Gastaut syndrome and fewer than that with Dravet syndrome.

“It’s very important that we have additional treatments because these patients have very, very difficult to control seizures,” said Dr. Jerzy P. Szaflarski, a neurology professor at the University of Alabama at Birmingham, who directs the university’s epilepsy division. “I get questions about cannabidiol almost every day,” he said.