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IMAGES46 GUIDE TO WELLNESS CR.ORG
laws also require some testing.
But even among those states, stan-dards vary substantially, with some
regulating cannabis products,
including CBD-only ones, as if they
are pharmaceutical products and
others as if they are agricultural ones,
says Jennifer Liebreich, at the Asso-
ciation of Public Health Laboratories,
which works with state and federal
agencies on strengthening laboratory
systems and testing programs, includ-
ing those for cannabis.
Can Consumers
Legally Buy CBD?
If you live in one of the 47 states that
has legalized CBD to one extent to
another, you have no worries about
buying it in your state. While the
federal situation is still a little hazy, no
one has been prosecuted for buying
CBD online, according to Melvin
Patterson, a spokesman for the Drug
Enforcement Administration, and Paul
Armentano, deputy director of NORML,
a marijuana advocacy group.
Moreover, provisions in the 2018
Farm Bill, recently signed into law
by President Donald Trump, could soon
clarify how CBD is regulated by the
Food and Drug Administration. While
the agency has approved CBD for use
in one prescription drug, Epidiolex,
it’s now considering whether it
will regulate other CBD products as
prescription drugs (which can include
claims about their ability to treat
and cure health problems, and must
undergo extensive study before they
are approved) or dietary supplements
(which can't make those claims,
and aren’t subject to rigorous review.)
As for doctors’ role, physicians
don’t write prescriptions for CBD
(other than Epidiolex) in part because
of cannabis’s confusing federal
legal status.
Instead, doctors “recommend” the
treatment, allowing a consumer to
then purchase the product, often at
a licensed dispensary.
In practice, however, many peoplebuy CBD products without ever con-
sulting with a physician.Should You Trust
Online CBD Products?
There may be some additional
reasons to be particularly cautious
about pro-ducts ordered online, says
Amanda Reiman, Ph.D., a cannabis
policy and public health expert based
in California who also works for
Flow Kana, a cannabis company. She
notes that there may be less oversight
of those products than there is of
store-bought ones, making their purity
and potency even less certain.
Research backs her up. A November
2017 study in JAMA, authored by
Vandrey at Johns Hopkins, found that
only 26 of 84 samples of CBD oils,
tinctures, and vaporization liquids
purchased online contained the
amount of CBD claimed on their
labels. Eighteen of them had THC
levels possibly high enough to cause
intoxication or impairment, especially
in children. And a quarter had less
CBD than advertised. Similarly, FDA
testing has found several “CBD”
products with no CBD at all.
Some companies that make CBD
products say they also contract with
third-party testers to do additional
analysis beyond the state require-
ments. Kevin Liebrock, chief operating
officer at Bluebird Botanicals in
Louisville, Colo., says that’s what his
company does. And he says that it posts
the results online, so customers can
check to see that they are “getting
the advertised amounts of cannabinoids,
like CBD, and that the product is free
of contaminants.”
Other companies, such as Floyd’s
of Leadville, also post their results
online. And Maggie Frank, national
educator at CV Sciences, maker
of PlusCBD Oil, says customers should
ask to see the Certificates of Analysis,
or COAs, which show the results of
those tests. If a company won’t do that,
she says, “that’s a red flag.”In the Lab
CBD goes through a
series of processing
stages on its path
to becoming a
consumer product.CBD for Pain Relief?