Chile has harvested its first crop of medicinal marijuana as part of a pilot programme that is aimed to ease the pain of cancer sufferers.

Cameras were allowed in to see the first harvested marijuana plants being picked at the heavily guarded growing facility in the La Florida district of Chile’s capital Santiago.

The 850 cannabis seeds from the Netherlands, were first planted in October following a decision by Chilean health authorities to allow marijuana to be grown for medicinal purposes.

One in 10 synthetic cannabis users have described "feeling like they were either going to die or that they had died already" in a new survey into the use of the drug.

Respondents said they experienced everything from intense panic attacks, vomiting, seizures and paranoia right through to heart attacks and addiction.

The University of New South Wales' National Cannabis Prevention and Information Centre study involved the largest ever survey about synthetic cannabis use, asking 1700 young Australians about their experiences, 1100 of which had tried synthetic drugs.

For the past decades, Jamaica has been in a downward economic spiral and the trend continues year after year. Looking back 30 years, real per capita GDP averaged only one per cent, making Jamaica one of the slowest-growing developing countries in the world.

We are at a debt-to-GDP ratio of 138.9 per cent, ranking us among the highest in the world. The national unemployment rate of Jamaica is 13.4 per cent compared to 5.5 per cent in the US. Unemployment among the youth is twice the national rate, according to the latest World Bank report. The poverty rate has increased by eight per cent in a few years.

If Minnesota approves limited industrial hemp growth, a state senator with a long-time law enforcement background fears recreational marijuana use will be close behind.

"To me, it is baby steps toward recreational marijuana and I think we will find that out by the end of the session," Sen. Bill Ingebrigtsen, R-Alexandria, said Wednesday after a committee approved a bill to allow hemp to be grown by researchers.

Ingebrigtsen predicted attempts will be made to amend the hemp bill to include recreational marijuana use. Minnesota law allows a limited use of medical marijuana, but recreational use remains illegal.

Sen. Kent Eken, DFL-Twin Valley, brought the hemp bill to the Senate Environment, Economic Development and Agriculture Finance Division.

The medical marijuana company New England Treatment Access has received state approval to grow medical marijuana in Franklin and sell it in Northampton.

The Department of Public Health gave NETA its certificate of registration, which allows it to proceed with growing marijuana, on April 3. There will be one final inspection of the dispensary before NETA can begin to sell marijuana.

"We're now in the process of cultivating, and we'll hopefully be serving qualified patients this fall," said Dot Joyce, a spokeswoman for New England Treatment Access.

The Drug Enforcement Administration on Wednesday recommended that the federal government produce almost 900 pounds of marijuana for research in 2015, more than triple the amount it had estimated it would need.

Yes, marijuana has curative properties - that's indisputable. But are we over-hyping it, have we attributed to much weight to the term "medical marijuana"? Have we convinced ourselves that cannabinoids have more corrective capabilities than they actually do? If they haven't, we're doing ourselves an incredible disservice. 

A Chilean municipality harvested legal medical marijuana Tuesday as part of a government-approved pilot project aimed at helping ease pain in cancer patients.

The harvest comes after Chile's first planting of pot for medical uses in October 2014. It is the work of a municipality in the capital of Santiago and the Daya Foundation, a nonprofit group that sponsors pain-relieving therapies.

"We're laying the foundations for what will be the national production of medical cannabis," Daya's president, Ana Maria Gazmuri, said after cutting branches from cannabis plants.

Oil extracted from about half of some 850 plants imported from the Netherlands will be given to 200 patients in the coming months.

INDIANAPOLIS – Brian Bennett thought oil extracted from marijuana plants to treat children with severe epilepsy, like his son, might just be legalized this year.

A proposal sailed through the Indiana House, carried by some conservative Republicans, without a single vote in opposition.

But Bennett’s hopes were dashed Tuesday, when a Senate committee stopped the measure in light of opposition from prosecutors who likened it to legalizing medical marijuana.

“This is ‘reefer madness,’ ” said a frustrated Bennett. “We shouldn’t be making decisions based on scare tactics.”

The Government has moved to make ganja a "ticketable" offence -- like to be fined for exceeding the speed limit -- and to make it legal for medical and religious uses. Consumers were given choice, but this was never an option for tobacco. Still, as we are not good at obeying rules; those who are minded to drink, smoke, or shoot it up will beat the gate. Within a year, people will be doing as they wish and, as market forces kick in, they will cuss the US Feds for not allowing us to send Christmas gifts of ganja to New York relatives.