Cannabidiol Oil is not just a short lived trend, the public’s interest in how it works and its benefits are steadily growing, as you can see in the Google Trend graph below.
A few years ago anything remotely related to cannabis would have been shunned as shady but now even the more established media outlets are shining the spotlight on cannabidiol products.
The New York Times recently dedicated an article to the benefits of CBD, Forbes writes about the best CBD gummies and others are reporting miracle healings.
Is the hype justified?
Cannabidiol, usually referred to as CBD, is one of the active ingredients of cannabis, also more commonly known as marijuana. Unlike THC, CBD does not make you high and according to the World Health Organization it does not have any dependence potential, so no danger of addiction.
Archeological evidence shows that medical use of cannabis goes back some 2,800 years. Despite the long history, and recent popularity, of using cannabis for therapeutic reasons, there are surprisingly few conclusive studies on the benefits of cannabinoids.
Cannabidiol has been the center of many studies to understand its effects on anxiety, pain and movement disorders, to name a few, but there is not enough data to draw concrete conclusions. So far the FDA has only approved the use of Epidiolex as a prescription drug to treat epiletic seizures.
Nevertheless the CBD market is promising, analysts estimate US sales to exceed the billion dollar mark soon.
Does CBD oil have benefits
CBD oil is just one method, of many, to consume cannabidiol. Regardless of the health benefits, CBD oils have the advantage of making it easier to dose your CBD intake according to your daily needs. It also makes it easier to supplement your food or drinks with CBD, for a little more diversity.
There are discussions over what is better oil or gummies. Leia Nunes from Verma Farms says
“Gummies need longer to digest, usually have a stronger CBD effect and are easy to take, ideal for controlled dosing. Whereas CBD oils blend the benefits of the oils with that of the CBD and can be used in a wide variety of ways, not only orally.”
There are lots of claims about the benefits of CBD, generally research has shown that it can be effective in managing anxiety, helping with chronic pain and proven to help with seizures but there is no evidence that it can help with serious conditions like cancer, despite the numerous accounts you can find on the internet.
As a natural product CBD will most probably help some people more than others, like herbal supplements. In the case of insomnia, studies show that it helps people with certain certain conditions but has not shown much effect in helping healthy people to sleep better. For example mint might help when you have heartburn but otherwise it will only freshen your breath at best.
Is CBD oil safe
Cannabidiol itself is deemed to be safe, side effects like nausea and fatigue have been observed during the trials for Epidiolex but no one has come forward with any real concerns about using CBD, that is why it is freely available as a supplement.
The main concern is that the FDA does not regulate the safety and purity of supplements, so there is no real control over the ingredients and doses listed on labels. Studies have shown that a large percentage of products purchased online are mislabeled. That is why choosing the right brand or supplier is very important when it comes to CBD oils. For example Amazon does not allow the sale of cannabidiols, it is therefore safe to assume that any products advertised as CBD supplements do not actually have any CBD in them.
Conclusion
Cannabinoids have been used as medicine for millennia, there are more positive accounts about the positive effects than otherwise, therefore it is easy to conclude that there must be some benefit in cannabis other than getting high.
It would be dangerous to see CBD as a miracle drug that can cure anything, because there is absolutely no proof to support that idea. But it is safe to say that a lot of researchers are hopeful that it can be used to treat a lot of conditions.
Nevertheless, if you plan to use it as a medicine, it doesn’t harm to consult your doctor to make sure it doesn’t affect other medications that you might be taking.
