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Cannabis Campaigners' Guide News Database result:
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UK: Bayer backs GW's cannabis drug Stephen Foley The Independent Thursday 22 May 2003 GW Pharmaceuticals, the little drug group developing painkillers made from cannabis, has won the backing of one of Europe's biggest pharmaceutical companies for its under-the-tongue spray. Bayer, the German company famed for discovering aspirin, has signed up to sell GW's drug in the UK in a deal that could be worth up to £25m. GW will also be keeping more than 40 per cent of the profits from future sales. GW will get most of the £25m from Bayer when its painkiller - to be called Sativex - is approved by the medical authorities in the UK. GW is so confident of approval that it will borrow against those future milestones as it readies its manufacturing for the launch, which could come next year. The company cultivates cannabis in a giant greenhouse at a secret location in the UK, and has a back-up contract with another secret grower. Geoffrey Guy, GW's founder and chairman, said Sativex would be a prescription-only spray for treating the symptoms of multiple sclerosis and severe neuropathic pain. He said: "The deal with Bayer is a third-party endorsement of what we have been up to. Someone of the standing of Bayer has done due diligence over the last four or five months and has validated our systems and that we are a pharmaceutical company capable of supplying them." GW shares, which were 2.5p higher at 234.5p yesterday, have run up in recent weeks amid speculation that a marketing deal with a European drugs giant was imminent. Early talks with GlaxoSmithKline, the UK's number one pharmaceutical group, failed when GSK decided it did not want to be associated with a drug derived from cannabis.
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