David Fayos says:
–The client's name isn't Manuel, but let's give him that name, if you don't mind.
-Ok go on.
–Well then: Manuel, who is 65 years old, had called me in October. He was talking to me on the phone, but I didn't understand anything he was saying to me.
–¿...?
He has Parkinson's, with a stiff jaw. She could barely communicate. With a lot of effort, he made me understand that maybe I could help him through my cannabis recipes. I made him come to the medical center and we started treatment.
-Y...?
Three weeks later he called me again. Then it was already another. Now, Manuel spoke relaxed and vocalizing. And he was complaining: 'I'm not sure this is working. And I answered: 'What doesn't work? Don't you realize how you're talking to me? If I understand everything you say!’. And then he noticed the change. And he told me that his tremors had also decreased somewhat...
David Fayos is now excited. He shows it in his eyes.
He is the CEO of Cannabity Healthcare, a firm specializing in therapeutic cannabis that has been operating online for four years (it has 4,000 customers) and that just two months ago opened a physical store in the heart of Sant Cugat del Vallès.
We are talking right there, in the store, and we are joined by Gemma Mengual and Patricia Díaz, her partner at Así Está El Patio SL.
The reader will have heard of Gemma Mengual (45).
He has been a star of artistic swimming, with his two Olympic podiums and his 34 medals between World and European Championships, collected between 2000 and 2009, and now he continues to collaborate with the Spanish mermaids, and has activated various projects, such as a restaurant Japanese cuisine.
"I wish I had used therapeutic cannabis in my sports days," says Mengual. It would have prevented me from injury. He would have treated me for abductors, bursitis, tendinitis... I spent years with anti-inflammatories, with many drugs. The discipline demanded it of me, the eight hours a day of training.
–And now you consume it?
–At night I take my sublingual drops (holds them under the tongue for a minute). And my life has changed, especially the dream. Before I needed to read to disconnect. Now I can't stand five minutes watching a series. And the chronic back pain has vanished, those that the physios treated me.
(...)
David Fayos raises his finger:
–This has nothing to do with those recreational clubs whose doors were crossed by some cancer patients who went to look for cannabis.
It proposes to enter the universe of therapeutic cannabis in depth, dismantle prejudices, argue its benefits in all medical and sports fields.
The EU legalized the use of therapeutic cannabis as a food supplement in 2018. The World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) withdrew it from the list of prohibited substances in 2019. In Spain, the Health and Consumer Commission approved it in Congress last June 27th.
"I don't understand how we've been so late," says David Fayos. I guess the drug companies have held back their expansion as long as they can. It is true that there were Sativex and Epidiolex, patented synthetic drugs. But its costs are disproportionate: treating yourself with Epidiolex is around 20,000 euros per year.
And what about your bottles?
He shows me a bottle of CBD oil from Lecann Healthcare, a firm that sells Mengual.
–The most expensive is around 45 euros.
And explain the formula:
–In the cannabis plant there are more than a hundred components. Barely twenty have been investigated. Its benefits can be magnificent, since they are combined with our endocannabinoid system (ECS), which regulates sleep, hunger, mood, pain... The ECS can be reinforced with vitamins, such as CBD oil: they help us in the mental sphere, anxiety, insomnia or stress, or regulate blood sugar. It is not a magical plant, but it is effective in osteoarthritis, painful menstruation, epilepsy, children with autism. And of course, it helps the athlete...
