Cannabidiol in the context of "Cannabis (drug)"

Hemp, or industrial hemp, is a plant in the botanical class of Cannabis sativa cultivars grown specifically for industrial and consumable use. It can be used to make a wide range of products. Along with bamboo, hemp is among the fastest growing plants on Earth. It was also one of the first plants to be spun into usable fiber 50,000 years ago. It can be refined into a variety of commercial items, including paper, rope, textiles, clothing, biodegradable plastics, paint, insulation, biofuel, food, and animal feed.

Although chemotype I cannabis and hemp (types II, III, IV, V) are both Cannabis sativa and contain the psychoactive component tetrahydrocannabinol (THC), they represent distinct cultivar groups, typically with unique phytochemical compositions and uses. Hemp typically has lower concentrations of total THC and may have higher concentrations of cannabidiol (CBD), which potentially mitigates the psychoactive effects of THC. The legality of hemp varies widely among countries. Some governments regulate the concentration of THC and permit only hemp that is bred with an especially low THC content into commercial production.

Cannabis (/ˈkænəbɪs/), commonly known as marijuana (/ˌmærəˈwɑːnə/), weed, pot, and ganja, among other names, is a non-chemically uniform psychoactive drug from the Cannabis plant. Native to Central or South Asia, cannabis has been used as a drug for both recreational and entheogenic purposes and in various traditional medicines for centuries. Tetrahydrocannabinol (THC) is the main psychoactive component of cannabis, which is one of the 483 known compounds in the plant, including at least 65 other cannabinoids, such as cannabidiol (CBD). Cannabis can be used by smoking, vaporizing, within food, or as an extract.

Cannabis has various mental and physical effects, which include euphoria, altered states of mind and sense of time, difficulty concentrating, impaired short-term memory, impaired body movement (balance and fine psychomotor control), relaxation, and an increase in appetite. Onset of effects is felt within minutes when smoked, but may take up to 90 minutes when eaten (as orally consumed drugs must be digested and absorbed). The effects last for two to six hours, depending on the amount used. At high doses, mental effects can include anxiety, delusions (including ideas of reference), hallucinations, panic, paranoia, and psychosis. There is a strong relation between cannabis use and the risk of psychosis, though the direction of causality is debated. Physical effects include increased heart rate, difficulty breathing, nausea, and behavioral problems in children whose mothers used cannabis during pregnancy; short-term side effects may also include dry mouth and red eyes. Long-term adverse effects may include addiction, decreased mental ability in those who started regular use as adolescents, heart disease, chronic coughing, susceptibility to respiratory infections, and cannabinoid hyperemesis syndrome.

Sublingual (abbreviated SL), from the Latin for "under the tongue", refers to the pharmacological route of administration by which substances diffuse into the blood through tissues under the tongue.

Many drugs are absorbed through sublingual administration, including cardiovascular drugs, steroids, barbiturates, benzodiazepines, opioid analgesics, THC, CBD, some proteins and increasingly, vitamins and minerals.

Cannabinoids (/kəˈnæbənɔɪdzˌ ˈkænəbənɔɪdz/) are several structural classes of compounds found primarily in the Cannabis plant or as synthetic compounds. The most notable cannabinoid is the phytocannabinoid tetrahydrocannabinol (THC) (delta-9-THC), the primary psychoactive compound in cannabis. Cannabidiol (CBD) is a major constituent of temperate cannabis plants and a minor constituent in tropical varieties. At least 113 distinct phytocannabinoids have been isolated from cannabis, although only four (THCA, CBDA, CBCA, and their common precursor CBGA) have a confirmed biogenetic origin. Phytocannabinoids are also found in other plants, such as rhododendron, licorice, and liverwort.

Phytocannabinoids are multi-ring phenolic compounds structurally related to THC, while endocannabinoids are fatty acid derivatives. Nonclassical synthetic cannabinoids (cannabimimetics) include aminoalkylindoles, 1,5-diarylpyrazoles, quinolines, and arylsulfonamides, as well as eicosanoids related to endocannabinoids.

A cannabis edible, also known as a cannabis-infused food or simply an edible, is a food item (either homemade or produced commercially) that contains decarboxylated cannabinoids (cannabinoid acids converted to their orally bioactive form) from cannabis extract as an active ingredient. Although edible may refer to either a food or a drink, a cannabis-infused drink may be referred to more specifically as a liquid edible or drinkable. Edibles are one of several methods used to consume cannabis. Unlike smoking, in which cannabinoids are inhaled into the lungs and pass rapidly into the bloodstream, peaking in about ten minutes and wearing off in a couple of hours, cannabis edibles may take hours to digest, and their effects may peak two to three hours after consumption and persist for around six hours. The food or drink used may affect both the timing and potency of the dose ingested.

Most edibles contain a significant amount of THC, which can induce a wide range of effects, including: heightened sensory perception, relaxation, sleepiness, dizziness, dry mouth, euphoria, depersonalization and/or derealization, hallucinations, paranoia, and decreased or increased anxiety. THC-dominant edibles are consumed for recreational and medical purposes. Some edibles contain a negligible amount of THC and are instead dominant in other cannabinoids, most commonly cannabidiol (CBD). The main characteristic of cannabis edibles is that they take longer to affect users compared to smoked cannabis.

In the United States, the non-medical use of cannabis is legalized in 24 states (plus Guam, the Northern Mariana Islands, the U.S. Virgin Islands, and the District of Columbia) and decriminalized in 7 states, as of November 2023. Decriminalization refers to a policy of reduced penalties for cannabis offenses, typically involving a civil penalty for possessing small amounts (similar to how a minor traffic violation is treated), instead of criminal prosecution or the threat of arrest. In jurisdictions without penalty the policy is referred to as legalization, although the term decriminalization is sometimes used for this purpose as well.

During a wave of decriminalization in the 1970s, Oregon became the first state to decriminalize cannabis in 1973. Ten more states followed by the end of 1978, influenced by the Shafer Commission's endorsement of decriminalization in 1972. By the end of the decade the tide had turned in the other direction, however, and no state would decriminalize again until 2001.