The collaborative research from The University of Queensland and Botanix Pharmaceuticals Limited finds that the nonpsychoactive component of cannabis can penetrate and kill a wide range of bacteria including those responsible for gonorrhoea, meningitis and legionnaires disease.
The UQ Institute for Molecular Bioscience’s Associate Professor Mark Blaskovich said this creates potential for a new class of antibiotics for resistant bacteria with the ability to spare the natural microbiome by not killing beneficial commensal bacteria.
“This is the first time CBD has been shown to kill some types of Gram-negative bacteria. These bacteria have an extra outer membrane, an additional line of defence that makes it harder for antibiotics to penetrate.”
The study also showed that CBD was widely effective against a much larger number of Gram-positive bacteria than previously known, including antibiotic-resistant pathogens such as MRSA (methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus) or ‘golden staph’.
Dr Blaskovich said cannabidiol was particularly good at breaking down biofilms—the slimy build-up of bacteria, such as dental plaque on the surface of teeth—which help bacteria such as MRSA survive antibiotic treatments.
The research team at the Centre for Superbug Solutions mimicked a two-week patient treatment in laboratory models to see how fast the bacteria mutated to try to outwit CBD’s killing power.
“Cannabidiol showed a low tendency to cause resistance in bacteria even when we sped up potential development by increasing concentrations of the antibiotic during ‘treatment’,” Dr Blaskovich added.