Charlotte Figi was an American girl, who started getting seizures when she was just 1 year old. The seizures started out fairly mild and just a few per day, but by the age of 5 she was having dozens of seizures every day and they were growing in intensity. It got to the point where she was essentially always having a seizure and her parents needed to find out what was going on. None of the doctor's they went to see could help them in any way, nor did they know what she was suffering from. After her parents searched the internet looking for answers they discovered finally that she had Dravet Syndrome, a rare genetic mutation which causes grand mal seizures. With more research and the eventual help of two physicians came the conclusion that they only had one answer, they needed to try giving her high CBD cannabis. The problem was getting hold of it but they eventually managed to find a dispensary which sold some, so they bought it and took it home. With the help of friends who had the skills they were able to make an oil out of it. They gave it to Charlotte and miraculously her seizures stopped, for 4 days! Charlotte's parents needed to buy more but unfortunately the dispensary didn't have any more of that particular strain, so they were forced to continue their search for an alternative high CBD strain. This led them to The Stanley Brothers, one of Colorado's biggest growers and dispensary owners, who were cultivating new super high CBD and super low THC strains of cannabis. The Stanley Brothers were skeptical of giving cannabis to a young child, but the Figi family went to see them and met Jesse Stanley, who after spending a short time with Charlotte knew that he had to help her and agreed to supply the family. After further work to perfect the strain and prove it had as little THC content as possible they named the strain Charlotte's Web and they charged only what the family could afford. Now that the family has all the medical cannabis that they need, Charlotte has only a few seizures a month where usually she would have had nearly a thousand. Needless to say medical cannabis has saved not only her life, but the life of her family too and Charlotte's story has inspired changes to medical marijuana laws across the US.  

 

 

Given that medical marijuana has also helped and saved the lives of countless other people why should such a useful commodity be made illegal to those who desperately need it? This story has helped to spur on the legalization of medical cannabis around not only the U.S but the whole world. As more and more research is being done into the effectiveness of cannabis against all kinds of conditions we are learning more and more about how critical it is that this miraculous plant be made available to those who need it.