Which Marijuana Strains Block the Coronavirus' Cellular Pathways the Best? Dr. Kovalchuk Explains!
(READ ABOUT HIS CANNABIS COVID BREAKTHROUGH STUDY)
Dr. Igor Kovalchuk burst on the cannabis scene just last week with his publication that specific strains of cannabis can inhibit the spread and growth of coronavirus. We sat down with Dr. Kovalchuk to go over his study, how cannabis can act as a “block” to certain pathways the virus needs to enter a human cell (thank you, endocannabinoid system!), and what strains of cannabis should people be using in order to get the best advantage over COVID-19 they can from the marijuana or hemp plant. Yes, we ask if CBD from CBD, the stuff that is 100% legal across the USA, could have the same inhibiting factors as the heavier THC-laden marijuana plant. Should you be using high CBD strains or more of a 1:1 ratio of THC or CBD strain? What commercial products should you buy at a dispensary right now? Did he ever think his study would go viral like it has now with mentions on CNN, Barstool Sports, and others?
Click the link below and watch the full 40 interview with Dr. Kovalchuk and then follow the full transcript below for any quotes or references you may want to show friends, share with people, or write your own blog posts or articles as a follow up! Enjoy!
What Marijuana Strain Helps Block the Coronavirus Pathway Into the Cells? Dr. Kovalchuk Talks LIVE! from CannabisNet on Vimeo.
Jimmy Young:
Hi everyone, welcome to another edition of Weed Talk Now. I'm Jimmy Young, the founder of Pro Cannabis Media.
Curt Dalton:
I'm Curt Dalton, the founder of cannabis.net.
Jimmy Young:
Joining us all the way from Alberta in Canada, is Dr. Igor Kovalchuck. He is at the University of Lethbridge in Calgary, Alberta. Dr. Kovalchuck, thank you so much for joining us here on a beautiful spring day in the Northeast of America.
Dr. Igor Kovalchuk:
Thank you for having me, guys.
Jimmy Young:
Tell us a little bit about what you've been up to, because your reputation is one of the premier plant biologists in genetics. This is the thing that blows me away about the cannabis world, okay? Is you guys are... This is smartest group of people I've ever met. The fact that you can actually dictate the DNA of a plant and explain it, is unbelievable to me.
Jimmy Young:
First of all, congratulations on getting to the point where you are, have this reputation of being one of the top premier biologists and plant biologists in the world. Tell us a little bit about this study and why you decided to study COVID-19 and cannabis.
Dr. Igor Kovalchuk:
Right. We have been studying cannabis since about five years. For the past 12 years or so, I worked on medicinal plants, including medicinal poppy. As soon as cannabis became, let's say, more open in Canada, I thought it would be a great plant to study because, as you know, it provides us with food feed, shelter, medicine, clothes, you name it, right? That's probably the only plant that you would want to take with you into space, if it was the only one you could. Right?
Dr. Igor Kovalchuk:
When COVID started, we were well in the way of analyzing medicinal properties of those varieties. We have created almost 1500 hybrids and analyzed about 400 of them for the anti-inflammatory facts, for anti-cancer facts, anti-aging, skin diseases, oral health, you name it. When COVID started, as you understand, it's caused by a virus and it's a infection.
Dr. Igor Kovalchuk:
If it's infection, cannabis definitely should help. My wife hypothesized that this virus would enter in the same way as a SARS virus. At that time, it was late February. There was no such data yet. We reanalyzed the data that we have for multiple experiments that we do. We use so-called 3D tissues, engineered human 3D tissues, that mimic basically your oral cavity [inaudible 00:03:04], [inaudible 00:03:04]. We analyzed the expression of these receptors that virus potentially need to enter on the surface of the cells. We indeed identified several extracts that dramatically decrease the expression of the receptor. To simplify, imagine if you have a house, a building that has a hundred doors, and you have couple of thousand people crowd out door and they have to get in there, within a minute.
Dr. Igor Kovalchuk:
A hundred doors likely will allow them. If you reduce the number of doors to 20, perhaps, the chance of entering the same amount of time is very small. Any infection operates by units of infecting agent in time. If you have number of viral units that enter with our cells, there is a chance for infection to progress. If this virus stalled and cannot enter as efficiently, it will be eliminated by the immune system. Our immune system operates well, as it has either enough time or enough players. Enough players means antibodies, you've been exposed before. Enough time means the rate of infecting agents versus the rate of our system eliminated them. When we found that in the months we received the confirmation from the studies abroad that, indeed, this virus use ACE2 receptor for entry.
Dr. Igor Kovalchuk:
Therefore, what we found was cultivars basically gives us a very high degree of confidence that those cultivars will slow down or decrease the chance of infection and will slow down the progression of disease for one specific reason, because when the virus enters our cells, it forces all neighboring cells and other so-called target tissues to amplify this receptor. It's like you got spy and spy basically buys off others so that they work in concert. Basically, that's how the virus prepares your target. It may enter through lungs, for example, or oral cavity and will amplify receptors. Your intestine, your kidney and everywhere else where the target tissues is. In this way, it will force us to succumb to disease, yet more complications and whatnot. That's the first study that has been published. It has not been peer-reviewed. It, right now, is in the process of being peer-reviewed, but the pre-print is out there.
Jimmy Young:
Go ahead, Curt.
Curt Dalton:
Doctor, in your study, you mentioned sativa strains high in CBD. Did you start with a Charlotte's Web or an ACDC? What did you have access to strain, wise to start with?
Dr. Igor Kovalchuk:
It's interesting. Most of the names would mean nothing to the reader. Because those are not common names and most of them are created by us. Hybrids, we did not have. I can confirm that this was not ACDC or Charlotte's Web that we started with.
Dr. Igor Kovalchuk:
We started with agnostically completely. When we profiled 400 varieties for inflammation, we did not pay attention, indica, sativa, high, low CBD, THC. We first check was, it works. Only then we check what cannabinoid level is. We are checking cannabinoids level for only one specific reason. If the extract works, why should they care what's in it. We know it's safe because, through years of consumption, multiple studies, we know that cannabis is safe.
Dr. Igor Kovalchuk:
I would prefer this variety of strain to be high CBD, for one specific reason. If a patient takes it, I want the patients to be comfortable. I don't want the person to take my pill, oil, what not, and get high right away. Some people may be deterred by this. People who may have a disease do not want an additional impairment to happen. That's why we have focused only on those cultivars that would be high as a ratio of 1:1 CBD or CBD dominant. We have 2:1, 10:1, and as high as 20:1.
Jimmy Young:
Can I add [crosstalk 00:07:48] go ahead, Curt. [inaudible 00:07:47].
Curt Dalton:
Did any of the other cannabinoids really stand out to you as CBN or CBG, anything that really made your eyes wide open, other than CBD?
Dr. Igor Kovalchuk:
Great question. Most of the cultivars were, as I said, high as a 1:1 CBD to THC or CBD dominant. There was one cultivar that is [inaudible 00:08:18] THCD dominant, that does not work as well, but works as well. It's not as efficient, but pretty good. If we talk about single cannabinoids, in our work, we found that they work too, but not as efficiently as a full flower extract. As you understand, if you take the full flower extract, you have what, 50, maybe 60 different cannabinoids, and 50-60 terps, [inaudible 00:08:45] flavonoids, you name it. It would be extremely difficult and long to identify what is active ingredient or what is the cocktail? I believe it's the concerted actions of all molecules. Scientifically, very important to understand how and what works. If we have COVID out there and this helps, I don't think we should waste time, basically four or five years of research to identify those single molecules at work.
Jimmy Young:
You mentioned research, doctor. Here in the United States, as you know, it's still federally illegal, and there's only one college in the United States, one place that's officially able to research this, at the University of Mississippi. There's been a recent lawsuit, here in the United States, that was actually won by a research firm, exposing the United States for perhaps doing a little something, a little shady to keep the researchers at bay. In Canada, because it's federally legal, you actually get grants pretty, I don't want to say easily, because there's never easily getting a grant, but I'm guessing you get some cooperation from your government in Canada for research. Yes?
Dr. Igor Kovalchuk:
You're absolutely right. In the past, especially past two, three years, there've been a number of grants out there. Yes, a success rate as for any grants, maybe not high. Now, for some, 2%, for some it's 10%. Together with Olga, my wife, we had probably five or six over the last three years. So yes, if the idea is good... My, honestly, my gut feeling is, there is still some prejudice among the reviewers, right? Because when we reviewed, we're not reviewed and given the grant, because it's such a cool plan, but because our scientific hypothesis, stands ground and the experiments proposed are solid, and our names are good, and that's the combinations of gifts, the grant. But even then, sometimes you feel by the comments reviewers do, that they are not comfortable with the fact that all these effects are caused by cannabis, but it's changing, so it's getting better and better.
Dr. Igor Kovalchuk:
You cannot believe in past two weeks, how many calls I received from scientists and doctors. I received calls from doctor, from hospitals, from hospital in New York, who is in forefront, working with patients. He said that after he has seen an article, he was prescribing a CBD and CBG to patients. All six patients, elderly, that he's given, are doing extremely well. I have, basically, their emails and their statement about that.
Curt Dalton:
At one point, doctor, we had put an article up on cannabis.net, saying, could COVID be cannabis legalization's "what if" moment? Could we find a medical study that showed that it either lessened the strength, it helped with recovery? Do you feel your study is comprehensive enough, or a beginning to that moment in the US, where we could say, "We need to legalize, we need to study immediately. And this is the beginning. This is the study that shows us it can help."
(CLICK HERE TO READ THE "WHAT IF..." ARTICLE)
Dr. Igor Kovalchuk:
A word of caution right away. Our work is so-called preclinical, right? So we do not touch patients. We have not touched patients, yet. We are working, right now, on several clinical trials, including several US teams. If this would happen, it would basically expedite our applications and everything, but I agree. We have a great opportunity for studies like ours to influence policy making. Basically, I'm hoping that it will be now open and decriminalized and whatnot as soon as possible. Sometimes, situations like this influence politics. Most of the cases, politic influence situations.
Jimmy Young:
It wouldn't have anything to do with the almighty dollar, by any chance, would it? I'm just saying.
Jimmy Young:
No, you know Curt and I are both located here in Massachusetts, where we originate this program. I understand that there's a local company, Matt tack, or MatTek Life Sciences out of Ashland, where you got your 3D tissue samples. Is that accurate?
Dr. Igor Kovalchuk:
Absolutely. It's a wonderful company. As you know, a lot of studies that you do in order for these studies to be very valid and close to a real situation, you have to use patients, right? You can only do it in clinical trials. That means most of the studies are never done, and they're never done because money is a big deal. People who are willing to do studies is a big deal.
Dr. Igor Kovalchuk:
The applications are extremely difficult. clinical trial applications requires concerted actions of many people. It's hundreds pages document, preparation of these clinical trials takes months and months, but if instead using 3D tissues, it's a wonderful idea. Basically it's an engineered human skin, and they can [inaudible 00:14:24] the cilial tissues, and they can do it sex-specific. If you suspect that males or females succumb to infection in the greater rate, they can generate the tissues of specific disease. For example, we have studied the psoriasis tissue. They send you engineered tissues, looks like psoriasis skin. We can directly apply the extract and see where the morphology changes, or you change the expression of molecules back to normal. That's how we identified almost a dozen varieties that strains that help to relieve psoriasis for them.
Curt Dalton:
This study, obviously it exploded in our industry. We're all looking for that study to show how cannabis can help with COVID. Now, it's really gone viral. You're getting picked up, this study and people rewriting and referencing your study all over media. Did you think when this came out, you would get this type of exposure and this type of virility?
Dr. Igor Kovalchuk:
It's a great question, and no, I didn't expect that. I'll be frank. The reason we put it out there, because we badly needed commercial and industrial partners to move us to clinical trial. So, no. we could go in to the hospital and we found people, doctors who were willing to do the study, but obviously it's an organization. People have to be paid. A clinical trial of this magnitude can be anywhere from 200 to $500,000. We do not have this money, but we know this is a medicine that will help. It was kind of an outcry. It's very unusual and not in the style of me and Olga. We've been around for a while in science and everything. We don't do this, but this situation is such that we felt if we don't do this, it will be buried for very long time and never help people. But now because guys like you and other journalists who picked it up, I have several, probably dozens of leads and two solid cases where, likely, we'll get a clinical trial done.
Jimmy Young:
That's exciting. That is, that is exciting. One of our own medical friends, Dr. Ryan Zaklin, has asked me to ask you this question about two specific cannabinoids, a CBDA and a THCA. Here's the thing about all the cannabinoids, and I've got some working knowledge of it, but I never took organic chemistry in college, let alone high school. Forget high school. I didn't even go near biochem labs in high school, but how can you identify each specific cannabinoid and, and the impact that one has on the other? Or is it more about the ratios of the CBD based ones versus the THC ones?
Dr. Igor Kovalchuk:
Jimmy, it's all of the above. First of all, it's not our intention to identify all cannabinoids, because it was not our intention to understand what works. Why? Because I do not believe that we'll identify one. The ratio, it likely is important. I give you an example. When we identified several varieties that work well for specific, rare cancer, we started doing ratios, let's say from 1:16 to 16:1. We've done profiling of 12 different ratios. We identify the golden spot where you've seen potentiation. That means that if you have one cultivar reduces, let's say the growth of cancer by say, two-fold, another one, two-fold one, put them together. They together were six-fold, for example. This is quite difficult. It takes a long time.
Dr. Igor Kovalchuk:
Therefore, there were some cases that we know what works. Example, when we did colon cancer versus breast cancer. We did, then we found cultivars that work and then don't work. Then we did correlations with a level of THC, CBD, and whatnot. For one cancer, and don't quote me on that. I don't quite remember, but I believe for colon cancer, we found positive and negative correlations clearly established for specific cannabinoids, but for breast cancer, it was completely irrelevant. We could not look at the cannabinoid's profile and tell whether the cultivar would work or not. Say it was terps. We identified couple terps that correlate very well, so their presence was a help. We actually negatively influenced the capacity of THC to kill the cancer. My point is that cannabis is not generic, whatsoever.
Dr. Igor Kovalchuk:
You cannot just look at a profile of cannabinoids and say, "This will help me" or "This will not help." In general, I would say high CBD variety should have anti-inflammatory properties. We are releasing the paper right now, a second one, on the cytokine storm. We identified varieties that dramatically reduce key proinflammatory molecules. We have selected from number of cultivars that work, we have selected seven. Out of this seven, two would do harm. Two would actually intensify inflammation. Three did very well and decrease that, and couple have no effects. This is already from preselected group, so one has to be careful and do the preclinical work like we've done before proposing that specific strain cultivar would work. Do not judge just by cannabinoids.
Curt Dalton:
You just walked into my next question, which all the viewers who wish they had access to you, will be watching this.
Curt Dalton:
Other than high CBD, I will ask you because that's what people will ask us, "Doctor, I live in California. I have a lot of dispensaries around me. I'm worried about COVID. What should I go buy?" Other than just saying a high CBD strain.
Dr. Igor Kovalchuk:
Well, just to make sure, I'm medical doctor, but I'm not licensed to practice and I cannot make any medical advice or not. I believe that high CBD, high terp profiled strain is better. If just a high CBD is of concern, then I would pick the variety that has a higher fragrance. We could see, in general, higher terp varieties that have a strong effect.
Curt Dalton:
You mentioned you didn't want to say a high THC because you didn't want patients to get that high effect, but what did THC in your studies show with COVID? Anything, as far as antiviral properties of THC to fight COVID-19? If someone didn't mind getting really high, would THC also help or you just say don't use high THC because of the high effect?
Dr. Igor Kovalchuk:
I have to be careful answering this question because there are some things that have been published or in that paper that we have released. We do not report, separately teach [inaudible 00:22:07]CBD. Therefore, what I would be saying, how should I say, I would be saying something that people have not seen the data for. Yes, there were varieties that were high THC that worked quite well, but the reason being, we did not want to focus on them, is that we do not want people that would take a medicine, be repelled, let's say, by medicine and not taking it again.
Dr. Igor Kovalchuk:
Every doctor that we talk to in Canada or US has the first concern is, "Will my patient take it?" In order for medicine to work, you have to take it regularly. You cannot skip. A lot of patients that haven't seen it, or haven't tried if they try it once and it doesn't work, they feel uncomfortable, no tingling, or whatever, they will not take it anymore. That means the medicine will not show its potential. To cut this and answer your questions, yes. THC works, not all varieties. We haven't used the THC dominant cultivar but 1:1, let's say, initial six, 7% of THC or CBD in the flowers work as well as high CBD.
Jimmy Young:
Can I ask a question about terpenes for a second here, doctor? I've talked to a few other cannabis experts, scientists, about terpenes and the role that they play in this plant. Can you describe the relationship between the terpene makeup and other cannabinoids, like your CBDA and G, A-B-C, one, two, three? I'm sorry.
Dr. Igor Kovalchuk:
If you look by chemistry, the initial pre-course is somewhere on the top of the pathway, is the same. The rule of thumb is, again, don't quote me on that, but if the variety is high in cannabinoids, typically it's high in terps. Then specific terp that is produced, of course, depends on the availability of many enzymes. That's where cannabis gives a wonderful opportunity to have, because it has such a broad number of varieties. Imagine you are, even if you take five to 10 major cannabinoids. If you take five to 10 major terpenoids, the possibilities of the ratios and presence of one or another are almost endless. You may have thousands of different possibilities. Therefore, you may find, nearly always you find the variety that works well for the condition.
Dr. Igor Kovalchuk:
Typically, cannabis works well for conditions that are involved in chronic inflammation. That's where cannabis thrives, I believe. Some terps directly influence cannabinoids. Some terps actually combine to the same receptors. They combine to CB1, the CB2 receptors or any other G protein coupled receptor and that have either identical effect or skewed effects.
Dr. Igor Kovalchuk:
If you have a lock and you have a perfect key, you open it fairly quickly, and the result, you enter. You may have a terp that combined and the key would kind of stuck, but then finally work. In fact, would be slightly different, but similar. Then you may have a combination when two molecules compete this way for you, you take CBD and THC. CBD is a partial agonist of THC. The higher the CBD in the variety, the more chances that the effect of your THC will be altered. It may be altered that you will feel less high. It may be altered that it will be less painkilling. It may be altered it will be more painkilling. That depends on all other molecules. That's why cannabis is extremely difficult to figure out in terms of what exactly is an active molecule.
Curt Dalton:
I have to ask, doctor, here in America, I live in a state, not in Massachusetts, but if someone says, "I can only get legal access to hemp CBD with almost no THC, is that as good? And should I use it? Or how does the hemp CBD play into what you think of the THC, CBD 1:1 ratio?
Dr. Igor Kovalchuk:
It's a brilliant question. I love your American hemp or our Canadian hemp for one specific reason. Our hemp industry was, I shouldn't say it was more established because you guys started growing hemp in 17th century, something like that. Most of our industrial hemp varieties were a classical, industrial hemp. That means tall, stocky, typically low fragrance, low CBD, pushing 2% maybe, in flowers and therefore, very low terps.
Dr. Igor Kovalchuk:
You guys registered number of varieties. I know in Oregon, for example, that are very high CBD and therefore, high in terps. The chances that they would work more efficiently, than our industrial hemp are much higher. From the varieties we have published, there was three or four that are industrial hemp, but those were not industrial hemp, that classical industrial hemp registered in Canada. We are only now preparing them for registration. Those varieties have higher level of CBD and better fragrance. They work more efficient. So in short, if it's a right variety, it doesn't matter whether it's a hemp or marijuana. As soon as it has molecules that work, they has high CBD. It has to be tested of course, because likely not all of them will work.
Jimmy Young:
Yeah. You mentioned, you mentioned testing and I've got just enough knowledge to be dangerous about the endocannabinoid system. Every human or every mammal has an endocannabinoid system. Every time you try a different strain, even if you try one or Curt tries one, I try one, it's going to have a different effect because of our internal endocannabinoid system and how it balances. How in the world, can you do all this research and then come back with findings about specific strains when you know that one, if I take it or Curt takes it and you take it, it's all going to have a different effect on all of us? You talk about a challenge? This is probably the most challenging plant in the world? Yes?
Dr. Igor Kovalchuk:
You opened the Pandora box, because of course, while even if you look at any trait, it's a numbers game. If you imagine you have an extra terrestrial land in, let's say in Sweden, and concluded all humans are 180, blond, tall, blah, blah, blah. But no. Unless you take a representation of everyone, you would not be making an average. If you want to register a drug and get the [inaudible 00:29:46] Dean number, you have to be clinical trial in specific population. If I want drug to be sold in Japan, I better test it Japanese. The variation in our response...
Dr. Igor Kovalchuk:
The way cannabis works, it starts from first how it enters in our organisms. The variability is enormous. It depends how you take it, whether you smoke it, you inhale it, it's a sublingual, it's intestinal. Smoking and taking the gel cap, the bioavailability would be different from 70, 80% down to five, 7%. When you ingest... The variation, also between two people, maybe one would have 5% bioavailability, another one would have 20% bioavailability. Not only genetic makeup, but so-called [inaudible 00:30:44] epigenetic makeup. It means environment, and environment would be as simple as whether you ate some fatty food or not. If you ate the fatty food, you will double or triple your bioavailability. That means you need a two, three times lower dose to have the same effect. In addition, all the genetic variation among human, sex differences, whether you healthy or not, there are a lot of diseases that have either the lower end, the cannabinoid system operation or higher.
Dr. Igor Kovalchuk:
In ideal world, you have to know this. You have to take a buccal swab or blood test and see what's the health of your endocannabinoid system. What receptors do you have expressed? Based on this, you can make a prediction on the dosage. Even then, the doctors advise to titrate.
Dr. Igor Kovalchuk:
Every clinical trial, almost, starts with low, goes high. Then, as soon as you start feeling uncomfortable, you return one step back and use the one that is high enough and gives you still a good effect. A combination, and it depends not only how it gets into your system, how it works on your receptors, but how quickly it is out.
Dr. Igor Kovalchuk:
Metabolizing enzymes are very different. You can have 20 fold difference in metabolism. That means if I take 10 million and I'm just exaggerating, if I take 10 milligrams of THC and I will feel high, let's say within, I don't know, an hour. Then in two hours, effect is gone because my metabolism's eliminated it. You may take this same dose. You will get high either faster or later and it will last for 12 hours. Because your metabolism is so slow that the system cannot basically kick it out of the organs very quickly, so enormous variations.
Curt Dalton:
Doctor, you mentioned this wasn't about going viral and being famous. You needed funding and you need more funding. [crosstalk 00:32:47] Study is very important to get US, federal legalization of the cannabis plant. If someone is watching this, how can they contact you? How can they get you funding? How can they communicate with you to get this further along?
Dr. Igor Kovalchuk:
Absolutely. I'm not sure whether... Well, preprints should have the email there, right? You can get in contact with me via my email or look me up on LinkedIn under my name. I typically respond to every person. If I didn't respond, that means I was overwhelmed, probably. I'll respond tomorrow or day after. Yes, I want opinion of everyone, even if it's just a statement that, "I have this and use this and it worked." I would like to hear from you if you're a doctor or just want to say "hi" and say what you do. I'm not in position, again, to advise doctors what to do, but I would love to hear the stories. If you're out there, businessmen and influencer or investor, whatnot, again, we have all the mechanisms using your help to advance this as far as possible.
Jimmy Young:
I hear start low, go slow. Remember that this is truly a plant medicine and you are self-medicating. You're actually acting like your own guinea pig when you ingest this stuff and take this stuff.
Jimmy Young:
Real quick, we've got COVID-19. I think everybody recognizes it attacks the respiratory system. I'm not a scientist, but I've read all about COVID-19. I want to talk to you about the way to ingest the cannabis plant. A lot of people still, the majority, use it and smoke it. They'll inhale it. They'll ignite it and then inhale it into their lungs. There are others out there that use tinctures. There are some that use gel caps. You even mentioned that as well. Is there a type of titration that is more effective or less effective, or again, does it come down to the individual's metabolism and use?
Dr. Igor Kovalchuk:
Again, it depends on different disease. If you strictly talk about COVID, there is a number of so-called gateway tissues. If you're not diagnosed yet, if you want to prevent yourselves, then use as mouthwash, a gargle, for example, as well as a gel cap, or oil, probably be the most advisable. If the person has healthy, there is no point of inhaling this. A mouth wash and gargle will prevent. Again, this is a hypothesis that has not been done on the real humans so I disclose so the people don't run and start doing this. That's what I think is going to happen. If you have a positive symptom, sorry, if you have been identified to have a disease and your symptoms are still mild, I still believe that the same combination mouth wash, gargle would be the best because mouth wash and gargle continuously exposed.
Dr. Igor Kovalchuk:
We have a great [inaudible 00:36:12] a house, let's say, to tissues in our throat and washing and continually exposing them would have a tremendous effect on the ability to reduce infection and whatnot. If the symptoms are associated with already was, was not... This is extremely difficult question to answer because it may harm people. Unless I identify, know all the blood parameters, the oxygen and whatnot, I cannot say whether the inhaling would work. I would definitely not smoke it. It's just counter-productive. Inhaler may be good. It would depend if the health of the lungs are still reasonably healthy and whatnot. Unfortunately, there is not a simple answer in here.
Jimmy Young:
No. It's a very complicated plant. There's no simple answers, right?
Dr. Igor Kovalchuk:
Yeah. Right. Yeah.
Jimmy Young:
Dr. Kovalchuk, I want to thank you for taking the time. Your study is awesome. We encourage people to continue to support research. If you can't get it done in the United States, look North of the border, because there are guys like Dr. Igor Kovalchuk, that are just waiting for you to write a check so he could do more research on the benefits of the cannabis sativa plant.
Jimmy Young:
Dr. Kovalchuck, best to your whole family. I think that you should start recording your family dinners because I'm guessing that would be very interesting conversation amongst all your researchers and your wife and daughter and the whole nine yards. Again, thank you very much for joining us on Weed Talk Now.
Dr. Igor Kovalchuk:
Thank you very much, guys. Have a good one.
Jimmy Young:
All right. And that'll do it for another edition of Weed Talk Now.
Jimmy Young:
I am your host, Jimmy Young, the founder of Pro Cannabis Media.
Curt Dalton:
I'm Curt Dalton from cannabis.net.
Jimmy Young:
Remember, it's a whole new world of weed out there. Use it responsibly. Thanks for watching. Thanks for listening.
Click below to watch the full 40-minute interview!
What Marijuana Strain Helps Block the Coronavirus Pathway Into the Cells? Dr. Kovalchuk Talks LIVE! from CannabisNet on Vimeo.
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