Pubdate: Sun, 09 Nov 2003 Source: Sunday Herald, The (UK) Copyright: 2003 Sunday Herald Contact: http://www.sundayherald.com/ Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/873 Author: Kath Gourlay Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/find?207 (Cannabis - United Kingdom) NUCLEAR FIRM GETS FIRST PATENT FOR CANNABIS INHALER The former commercial arm of the United Kingdom Energy Authority has developed a cannabis inhaler at the same plant which experimented with scientists inhaling plutonium. AEA Technology is the first to develop a system of cannabis delivery in expectation of the legal lid being lifted on the use of the drug for medicinal purposes. The company has filed a patent for an aerosol which would vaporise cannabis, allowing it to be inhaled as part of medical treatment for various illnesses. The medical use of cannabis looks more likely to be legalised after MPs voted to downgrade the drug from class B to class C as of January, ranking it alongside body-building steroids and some anti-depressants. The applicant address listed on the patent is 329 Harwell, Didcot, Oxfordshire: the same premises which housed the biomedical research labs where two human volunteers inhaled a form of plutonium through an aerosol. AEA Technology, which claims to operate separately from its Atomic Energy Authority parent company, says it knows nothing of any connection between the two areas of research, or indeed of the plutonium experiments. The company made a conscious decision to exit nuclear activities, said press officer Terry Collinson, who described its present status as "a rail and environment business". He added: "However, the intellectual property - such as registered designs and trademarks - is still potentially valuable, so the company is there to protect these. "Sometimes ideas have been patentable, and out of these we've selected certain ones which we felt could be of future benefit. The cannabis aerosol was one of these. Though I can't say whether it came about because a change in legislation was anticipated." He added: "We can't find any information on the plutonium experiments and people who might know have all moved on." The results of the European-Union-funded plutonium study are currently in the depths of the EU's radiation protection unit. One of those taking part in tests in the late 1990s, retired nuclear physicist Eric Voice, told the Sunday Herald he had no qualms about participating. Voice, a former Dounreay employee who still lives in Caithness, said: "It is the duty of people involved in the nuclear industry to ensure that no workers have a body burden of plutonium greater than accepted safety limits. That's what these trials were all about." Half a century ago Voice was one of the founder members of the Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament movement with Bertrand Russell, yet he remains convinced nuclear power is our only hope in the fight against global warming. Now in his 80s, (still working as a consultant nuclear physicist) he says he realised early on that protests from outside achieved very little, and felt more influence could be made from within the industry. He has recently finished editing the massive Scope-Radtest report commissioned by the Royal Society on the findings from 2600 nuclear weapons test explosions. The Radtest findings have horrified him, yet he has allowed his body to be used in medical experiments to discover how humans metabolise and excrete plutonium. He describes himself as "the most radioactive man on the planet". "The truth about plutonium is that it's a well known chemical element and there is nothing sinister about it," he said. Voice's neighbours became quite used to the regular visits of an armoured van to pick up his bodily waste. "When I arrived at people's houses with a carrier bag of bottles they assumed I'd brought them a gift," he said. "When I explained that I couldn't use their facilities their expressions were extremely comical." The question is: what will happen to his body, eventually? The local churchyard is surely not an option. "It has all been taken care of," he said. - --- MAP posted-by: Terry Liittschwager