Whoopi Goldberg, who is widely known to be both a woman and a weed smoker, is bringing the two together in a new marijuana venture.

Whoopi GoldbergGoldberg told Vanity Fair in March that she plans to start a medicinal cannabis business to help treat female medical concerns – including menstrual cramps. The Oscar-winning actress said she would team with Maya Elisabeth, one of the biggest names in the MMJ industry.

The new company will go by the name Maya & Whoopi and will provide a range of marijuana products for medical use, including edibles, topicals, tinctures, and even a bath soak described as “profoundly relaxing.” That may be Maya & Whoopi’s biggest selling point for women who experience painful cramps.

Goldberg told reporters the idea is to give women access to discreet, mostly non-intoxicating marijuana products that relieve cramps and other physical ailments without causing couch lock.

Filling a void in the market

“For me, I feel like if you don’t want to get high high, this is a product specifically just to get rid of discomfort,” she said. “Smoking a joint is fine, but most people can’t smoke a joint and go to work. This, you can put it in your purse. You can put the rub on your lower stomach and lower back at work, and then when you get home you can get in the tub for a soak or make tea, and it allows you to continue to work throughout the day.”

Goldberg is no stranger to cannabis, either the medical or the recreational sort. She’s talked at length about her love of vaping, which she uses to treat glaucoma and the headaches it causes. As a result, she said, she doesn’t rely on the kind of over-the-counter pain pills that can cause organ damage.

Marijuana Salve“I started using the vape pen because I stopped smoking cigarettes about four years ago and discovered I couldn’t smoke a joint anymore,” she said. “The relief that I got with the vape pen was kind of different from what I got with smoking. I could control it much better.”

But she decided something was missing from the picture, especially for fellow women. If marijuana could relieve headaches, why not cramps? So she went looking for products that could meet this need – and found nothing.

No shortage of demand

“Hey, this niche is half the population on the earth,” Goldberg said. “This seems to be people flippantly blowing you off, which is what you get whenever you start talking about cramps. They weren’t thinking, how do you target this? I have grown granddaughters who have severe cramps, so I said this is what I want to work on.”

That’s when she reached out to Elisabeth, who runs a Northern California MMJ company called Om Edibles. It quickly became clear they could tap into a massive, unserved market.

There is plenty of precedent for marijuana as a salve to fight menstrual cramps. Queen Victoria famously used the drug to treat her severe pain and discomfort during the 19th century. And now, as then, Goldberg promised, there will be no mystery about what women are taking: Every ingredient will be natural and plainly labeled.

Tell us: Is marijuana a good way to treat menstrual cramps? What other types of pain and discomfort do you think it could help?

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