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A new dietary supplement is revolutionizing the market: Products with CBD can alleviate many complaints - if high-quality products are purchased.
At Munich's main train station, a gentle scent of marijuana now often wafts through the air and confuses passers-by. If this is not forbidden in Germany, they seem to ask themselves while rushing to the train or strolling comfortably through the building. Dried hemp flowers, hemp oil, hemp chocolate and hemp lollipops can be bought there in a small shop - completely legal and without medical prescription. The furnishings are reminiscent of a hipster shop, the products are handed over a snow-white counter and the retro cabinets are reminiscent of a pharmacy. The salesman does not look like Bob Marley's trailer and does not greet his customers with a relaxed "What's up, man".
The products contain no THC, the substance that gives cannabis its intoxicating effect. Instead, they contain cannabidiol (CBD), a molecule derived from the female hemp plant that has anti-inflammatory, anxiety-relieving and relaxing effects - in humans and animals - also on the muscles. It binds to receptors in the body's own endocannabinoid system. While THC in cannabis provides the activating and psychoactive intoxication, CBD is the calming and neuroprotective ambivalent. Only three drops are given under the tongue to make nervousness, headaches or inflammations disappear. At least that is what many enthusiastic consumers promise. The dark green hemp oil comes as a capsule or as drops, has a bitter taste with a vegetable spice that reminds of the smell of damp earth or moss.
In Germany, CBD is freely available in drugstores, at kiosks or online, start-ups and shops are springing up like mushrooms in big cities. Well-known manufacturers are already working on soft drinks containing CBD. Consumers are enthusiastic, having found a remedy for depression, muscle spasms and chronic joint pain. Pain patients in turn report disappointedly that they feel nothing of the effect of the hemp elixir. CBD enjoys an existence between serious drug and natural product and a new "legal high".
Additional confusion is caused by the fact that traders of CBD oil are not allowed to give dosage recommendations or to list what CBD does. The products are considered to be food supplements and therefore may not have a pronounced pharmacological effect and may not be advertised therapeutically. As this also eliminates the official quality control, it is recommended to buy hemp products only in reputable shops and established online shops with quality promises to ensure that the content delivers what the label promises.
* This text may contain translation errors as the translation was performed by an online translation tool.
