Tinctures, salves, sprays, gummies and caramels are not always what they claim to be
CBD, a compound found in cannabis and hemp, zoomed from obscurity to omnipresence with breathtaking speed.
Relatively unknown just a few years ago, CBD-infused balms, said to help relieve pain and anxiety, now are prominently displayed at CVS pharmacies and Sprouts groceries. CBD shops have opened in Old Town and Pacific Beach, while CBD tinctures, bath salts, vaping cartridges, transdermal patches and other items are hawked at gas stations, farmer’s markets and across the internet.
Claims for these items’s health benefits range from the fraudulent — in July, the FDA warned a Massachusetts company to stop advertising its CBD nostrums as treatments for cancer, dementia and Parkinson’s disease — to the extravagant. A New York firm, Voesh, markets $500 CBD-treated collagen gloves as a way to “deliver an intense dose of moisture and visibly restore skin’s youthfulness.”
