By Steve Elliott
Hemp News
A researcher in Philadelphia says that THC, the main psychoactive ingredient in marijuana, could keep the HIV virus from entering the brain.
THC can block inflammation and slow down HIV's ability to reproduce itself when it attaches to a specific protein, according to Dr. Servio Ramirez, who is assistant professor of pathology at the Temple University School of Medicine, reports Lynne Adkins at CBS Philly.
"The idea is to prevent a lot of these cells from moving into the brain during the course of infection and if you are able to suppress or somehow control hive replication in this particular immune cell, the whgole hope is that less of these cells would be entering the brain through the course of infection," Dr. Ramirez said.
Keeping HIV out of the brain is important, because many of the drugs currently used to control the virus cannot get into the brain or are not effective once there, according to Dr. Ramirez.
(Photo of Dr. Servio Ramirez: Lynne Adkins)
