FEV1: Forced Expiratory Volume in the first second. The volume of air that can be forced out in one second after taking a deep breath, an important measure of pulmonary function.

STUDIES ON LUNG DISCEASES:

QUOTE: "In neither men nor women was marijuana smoking associated with greater declines in FEV1 than was nonsmoking, nor was an additive effect of marijuana"

CONCLUSION: "Heavy habitual marijuana smoking does NOT cause an accelerated decline in FEV1 with age"

SOURCES:

DP Tashkin, MS Simmons, DL Sherrill and AH Coulson
Department of Medicine, UCLA Schools of Medicine and Public Health, Los Angeles, CA 90095-1690, USA.

J. M. Tetrault, K. Crothers, B. A. Moore, R. Mehra, J. Concato, and D. A. Fiellin
Effects of Marijuana Smoking on Pulmonary Function and Respiratory Complications: A Systematic Review
Archives of Internal Medicine, February 12, 2007; 167(3): 221 - 228.

D. P. Tashkin
Effects of Marijuana on the Lung and its Defenses against Infection and Cancer
School Psychology International, February 1, 1999; 20(1): 23 - 37.

BIGGEST STUDY ON CANCER AND WEED:

"Tashkin's study, funded by the National Institutes of Health's National Institute on Drug Abuse, involved 1,200 people in Los Angeles who had lung, neck or head cancer and an additional 1,040 people without cancer matched by age, sex and neighborhood.

They were all asked about their lifetime use of marijuana, tobacco and alcohol. The heaviest marijuana smokers had lighted up more than 22,000 times, while moderately heavy usage was defined as smoking 11,000 to 22,000 marijuana cigarettes. Tashkin found that even the very heavy marijuana smokers showed NO increased incidence of the three cancers studied."

Source:

By Marc Kaufman
Washington Post Staff Writer
Friday, May 26, 2006; A03

STUDY ON CHILDBEARING and WEED:

Prenatal Marijuana Exposure and Neonatal Outcomes in Jamaica: An Ethnographic Study

OBJECTIVE: To identify neurobehavioral effects of prenatal marijuana exposure on neonates in rural Jamaica.

DESIGN: Ethnographic field studies and standardized neurobehavior assessments during the neonatal period.

SETTING: Rural Jamaica in heavy-marijuana-using population.

PARTICIPANTS: Twenty-four Jamaican neonates exposed to marijuana prenatally and 20 nonexposed neonates.

Measurements and main results: Exposed and nonexposed neonates were compared at 3 days and 1 month old, using the Brazelton Neonatal Assessment Scale, including supplementary items to capture possible subtle effects. There were no significant differences between exposed and nonexposed neonates on day 3. At 1 month, the exposed neonates showed better physiological stability and required less examiner facilitation to reach organized states. The neonates of heavy-marijuana-using mothers had better scores on autonomic stability, quality of alertness, irritability, and self-regulation and were judged to be more rewarding for caregivers.

CONCLUSIONS: The absence of any differences between the exposed on nonexposed groups in the early neonatal period suggest that the better scores of exposed neonates at 1 month are traceable to the cultural positioning and social and economic characteristics of mothers using marijuana that select for the use of marijuana but also promote neonatal development.

SOURCE:
Melanie C. Dreher (PhD1), Kevin Nugent (PhD1), and Rebekah Hudgins (MA1)
Schools of Nursing, Education, and Public Health, the University of Massachusetts, Amherst

STUDIES ON CANNABIS AND THE BRAIN:

Cannabis and psychopathological states:
Finally, no amnesia syndrome comparable to the Wernicke and Korsakov syndrome observed in chronic alcoholics, was observed in heavy cannabis users.

Cannabis and cerebral functions - Neurotoxicity:
"Former results suggesting anatomic changes in the brain of chronic cannabis users, measured by tomography, were not confirmed by the accurate modern neuro-imaging techniques. Moreover, morphological impairment of the hippocampus of rat after administration of very high doses of THC (Langfield et al., 1988) was not shown (Slikker et al., 1992). Thus, the post-mortem anatomical analysis of baboon brains, treated with high doses of cannabis for 8 months, do not show signs of neuronal injury or morphological activation of nervous tissue (Ames et al., 1979)"

"Cannabis is known to act on the hippocampus (an area of the brain associated with memory and learning), and impair short term memory and attention for the duration of its effects and in some cases for the next day. In the long term, some studies point to enhancement of particular types of memory.

"The dangerousness of a drug is evaluated from its ability to generate a psychic dependence (addiction). It is well established that the very large majority of cannabis users only occasionally use this product, and they can definitively discontinue use without difficulty."

"The "drift" towards hard drugs, the "gateway theory" (Nahas, 1993; Cohen and Sas, 1997) after chronic use of THC does not seem supported by the results of recent experiments in animals."

SOURCES:

"Excerpts from the Roques report, ordered by
B. Kouchner, released in June 1998"

"Iversen, L. 2003. Cannabis and the brain. Brain 126(6): 1252-1270."


Marihuana illegalization:

I know now that there is not a chance in hell of America's becoming humane and reasonable. Because power corrupts us, and absolute power corrupts absolutely. Human beings are chimpanzees who get crazy drunk on power.

* The first Bibles, maps, charts, Betsy Ross's flag, the first drafts of the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution were made from hemp; U.S. Government Archives.

* In 1916, the U.S. Government predicted that by the 1940s all paper would come from hemp and that no more trees need to be cut down. Government studies report that 1 acre of hemp equals 4.1 acres of trees. Plans were in the works to implement such programs; Department of Agriculture

* Henry Ford's first Model-T was built to run on hemp gasoline and the CAR ITSELF WAS CONTRUCTED FROM HEMP! On his large estate, Ford was photographed among his hemp fields. The car, 'grown from the soil,' had hemp plastic panels whose impact strength was 10 times stronger than steel; Popular Mechanics, 1941.
In September of 1937, hemp became illegal. The most useful crop known became a drug and our planet has been suffering ever since.
Congress banned hemp because it was said to be the most violence-causing drug known. Anslinger, head of the Drug Commission for 31 years, promoted the idea that marihuana made users act extremely violent. In the 1950s, under the Communist threat of McCarthyism, Anslinger now said the exact opposite. Marijuana will pacify you so much that soldiers would not want to fight.

Today, our planet is in desperate trouble. Earth is suffocating as large tracts of rain forests disappear. Pollution, poisons and chemicals are killing people. These great problems could be reversed if we industrialized hemp.
Natural biomass could provide all of the planet's energy needs that are currently supplied by fossil fuels. We have consumed 80% of our oil and gas reserves. We need a renewable resource. Hemp could be the solution to soaring gas prices.

Hempen plastics are biodegradable! Over time, they would break down and not harm the environment. Oil-based plastics, the ones we are very familiar with, help ruin nature; they do not break down and will do great harm in the future.

A large variety of food products can be generated from hemp. The seeds contain one of the highest sources of protein in nature. ALSO: They have two essential fatty acids that clean your body of cholesterol. These essential fatty acids are not found anywhere else in nature! Consuming pot seeds is the best thing you could do for your body. Eat uncooked hemp seeds.

The pot plant is an ALIEN plant. There is physical evidence that cannabis is not like any other plant on this planet. One could conclude that it was brought here for the benefit of humanity. Hemp is the ONLY plant where the males appear one way and the females appear very different, physically!
The hemp plant has an intense sexuallity. Growers know to kill the males before they fertilize the females. Yes, folks...the most potent pot comes from 'horny females.'

The reason this amazing, very sophisticated, ET plant from the future is illegal has nothing to do with how it physically affects us.....

...POT IS ILLEGAL BECAUSE BILLIONAIRES WANT TO REMAIN BILLIONAIRES!

I think the word 'DRUGS' should not be used as an umbrella-word that covers all chemical agents. Drugs have come to be known as something BAD. Are you aware there are LEGAL drugstores?! Yep, in every city. Unbelievable. Each so-called drug should be considered individually. Cannabis is a medicine and not a drug.

The most important plant in history

Why is hemp the most important plant in history? Because it contains the strongest and most durable soft-fiber of any plant on Earth. these strands can withstand heat, mildew, weathering, insects, light and time. Hemp also grows like a weed: fast and in bulk. And it will grow in almost any climate and environment. Furthermore, it has been used as a medicine worldwide for the last 3,000 years and has penetrated the social castes of nearly every culture and religion.

As a fabric, hemp is softer, warmer, more water absorbent, more breathable and more durable than most natural and man-made fibers. Its tensile strength is three times that of cotton. Approximately 50% of all chemicals used in American agriculture today are used on cotton. Hemp, on the other hand, needs neither herbicide (it grows so close together that little sunlight penetrates the ground to nurture weeds) nor pesticide (it is impervious to insects). Cotton is a soil leeching plant, that is, it takes nutrients out of the soil with every planting, which can leave valuable farmland severely lacking. Hemp, because of the way the stalk is harvested (roots, leaves and flowers are left on the ground to decompose), returns more nutrients into the ground than it takes with each planting.

As paper, hemp is stronger, more durable and archival compared to paper made from tree pulp. One acre of hemp produces as much fiber pulp as four acres of trees. It takes anywhere from 50 to 500 years for a tree to mature, whereas it takes a crop of hemp approximately 3 MONTHS to grow to harvest. You do the math. In addition, tree pulp must be bleached to make it white, where hemp is naturally white. As lumber board and building materials, it is superior in strength and flexibility, fire-resistant (!) and noted for its thermal and sound-insulating properties.

These are just a few examples of the 50,000 plus documented uses of the cannabis hemp plant. Amongst he most famous uses for hemp is weather and rot-resistant rope. However, the seed is rich in oil that can be used to make nontoxic paints and varnishes, lightning oil, soaps and shampoos, clean burning ethanol and methanol fuels, and BIODEGRADABLE PLASTICS (hello everyone??). And to top it all off, it is one of the world's healthiest foods, as the seed itself comes loaded with more Alpha-omega-3's than even the world's #1 food source today, the soybean.

We should DARE to speak the TRUTH no matter what the law is.

Hey Wisdom Reefer, why don't you slow down on the new threads?

Hey dude, I just finished with about all the threads I wanted to post. Any productive comments?

Hey Wisdom Reefer, why don't you slow down on the new threads?

Who died and made you 'Thread/post Length Moderator'?

You should listen to Jello Biafra's open word "grow more pot".

It touched on many of these things, and was very informative. Don't believe everything you hear though.

You should listen to Jello Biafra's open word "grow more pot".

It touched on many of these things, and was very informative. Don't believe everything you hear though.

Dude, I just read it, I found it very informative, and mostly true.

After all, Ford (August 13, 1941) made a car that ran on hemp fuel, and was made of hemp plastic.

I'm glad to see someone else has discovered the report on that study. Naturally it was not widely publicized in the U.S. Tobacco is a dangerous drug and cannabis isn't. So we sell the one in food stores and persecute people for using the other.Hey Wisdom Reefer, why don't you slow down on the new threads?Settle down, Beavis. You, of all people, are in absolutely no position to criticize anyone on this website.

That's interesting stuff, Wisdom Seeker. I am a little dubious about the supposed lack of harm of smoking herb. It is, after all, inhaling smoke into the lungs and breathing it out. Can't be good for you. Granted, pure herb is more natural than the stuff the cigarette companies put in their cigarettes. I remember reading a while back ago, that smoking a joint is comparable to smoking five cigarettes. That is because marijuana isn't smoked with a filter, whereas cigarettes are.

It also seems that many people who smoke a lot are stupid. Of course you could say that many people who don't smoke are stupid. But there seems to be a relationship. I've noticed that people who drink a lot aren't that stupid compared to people who smoke a lot. Marijuana seems to affect cognitive ability and memory substantially, in my observation. These people tend to forget a lot and not be focused on the present. Not the kinds of guys you would want working for you.

But who knows. The brain is able to fix itself. Maybe when these guys get off pot, their minds will snap right back.

I'm not quite convinced that smoking marijuana isn't bad for your lungs. May be less worse than smoking cigarettes, like you say, I wouldn't be so quick to call it perfectly harmless.

Most of the stuff you said here is inaccurate, heavily biased, and one sided. Nor did it include any sources whatsoever. Or rather, link sources that one can follow. I'm not a fan of book sources.

I've done a lot of research on marijuana due to past debates. I can say everything you've shoved out there has an equally evident other-side to it. Research has not exactly been conclusive due to how strongly both parties feel. Including smoking and lung diseases.

To you that are skeptic about this studies, just go here:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cannabis_(drug)

- Health issues and the effects of cannabis -

But this was not my first source of information, in my first research, I was also skeptic, but I found myself reading a LOT about this (having to do a 300 pages essay on cannabis) from biology books, and a lot more credible sources from the library.

NO study has ever demonstrated any harm for cannabis smoking, if you read reports in the 80s that weed is bad for you, I´m guessing it was government commercials. but these were greatly discredited with way more formal studies that have been done:

From the French Health Ministry :

http://www.chanvre-info.ch/info/en/Hemp-is-less-toxic-than-alcohol-or.html

Or from the National Institue of Drug Abuse:

http://www.nida.nih.gov/PDF/RRMarijuana.pdf

Or the Drug Library Organization:

http://www.druglibrary.org/schaffer/library/studies/canadasenate/vol1/chapter7_Cognitive_and_psychological_consequences. htm

Or this one:

http://www.drugscience.org/dl/dl_comparison.html

Or just take a look at the stats from the "US Department of Health and Human Services", and I quote: "[M]arijuana is rarely the only drug involved in a drug abuse death. Thus ... the proportion of marijuana-induced cases labeled as 'One drug' (i.e., marijuana only) will be zero or nearly zero."

http://www.medicalmarijuanaprocon.org/pdf/DAWN2001.pdf
http://www.medicalmarijuanaprocon.org/pop/deathreports.htm

HOW DANGEROUS IS MARIJUANA

COMPARED WITH OTHER SUBSTANCES?

Number of American deaths per year that result directly
or primarily from the following selected causes nationwide, according
to World Almanacs, Life Insurance Actuarial (death) Rates, and
the last 20 years of U.S. Surgeon Generals' reports.


TOBACCO
340,000 to 450,000


ALCOHOL (Not including 50% of all highway
deaths and 65% of all murders)
150,000+


ASPIRIN (Including deliberate overdose)
180 to 1,000+


CAFFEINE (From stress, ulcers, and triggering
irregular heartbeats, etc.)
1,000 to 10,000


"LEGAL" DRUG OVERDOSE (Deliberate
or accidental) from legal, prescribed or patent medicines and/or
mixing with alcohol - e.g. Valium/alcohol
14,000 to 27,000


ILLICIT DRUG OVERDOSE (Deliberate or accidental)
from all illegal drugs.
3,800 to 5,200


MARIJUANA
0


(Marijuana users also have the same
or lower incidence of murders and highway deaths and accidents
than the general non-marijuana using population as a whole. Crancer
Study, UCLA; U.S. Funded ($6 million), First & Second Jamaican
Studies, 1968 to 1974; Costa Rican Studies, 1980 to 1982; et al.
LOWEST TOXICITY 100% of the studies done at dozens of American
universities and research facilities show pot toxicity does not
exist. Medical history does not record anyone dying from an overdose
of marijuana (UCLA, Harvard, Temple, etc.).

(additional info and footnotes at: http://www.jackherer.com/comparison.html)

Or the fact that MJ KILLS some types of cancer:
http://www.mapinc.org/newscc/v01/n572/a11.html

Quotes by Peter McWilliams

* "Marijuana is the finest anti-nausea medication known to science." -- 1998 LP National Convention
* "Within seconds of the first toke, the nausea was gone, vanished with the smoke into the air." -- A Question of Compassion: An AIDS-Cancer Patient Explores Medical Marijuana
* "The Drug War is another Viet Nam." -- The DEA Wishes Me a Nice Day
* "To avoid situations in which you might make mistakes may be the biggest mistake of all." -- Life 101
* The federal prosecutor personally called my mother to tell her that if I was found with even a trace of medical marijuana, her house would be taken away.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peter_McWilliams

Am. J. Respir. Crit. Care Med., Vol 155, No. 1, 01 1997, 141-148.DP Tashkin, MS Simmons, DL Sherrill and AH Coulson, Department of Medicine, UCLA Schools of Medicine and Public Health, Los Angeles, CA 90095-1690, USA.
Heavy habitual marijuana smoking does not cause an accelerated decline in FEV1 with age

To assess the possible role of daily smoking of marijuana in the development of chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD), we evaluated the effect of habitual use of marijuana with or without tobacco on the age-related change in lung function (measured as FEV1) in comparison with the effect of nonsmoking and regular tobacco smoking. A convenience sample of 394 healthy young Caucasian adults (68% men; age: 33 +/- 6 yr; mean +/- SD) including, at study entry, 131 heavy, habitual smokers of marijuana alone, 112 smokers of marijuana plus tobacco, 65 regular smokers of tobacco alone, and 86 nonsmokers of either substance were recruited from the greater Los Angeles community. FEV1 was measured in all 394 participants at study entry and in 255 subjects (65 %) on up to six additional occasions at intervals of > or = 1 yr (1.7 +/- 1.1 yr) over a period of 8 yr. Random-effects models were used to estimate mean rates of decline in FEV1 and to compare these rates between smoking groups. Although men showed a significant effect of tobacco on FEV1 decline (p < 0.05), in neither men nor women was marijuana smoking associated with greater declines in FEV1 than was nonsmoking, nor was an additive effect of marijuana and tobacco noted, or a significant relationship found between the number of marijuana cigarettes smoked per day and the rate of decline in FEV1. We conclude that regular tobacco, but not marijuana, smoking is associated with greater annual rates of decline in lung function than is nonsmoking. These findings do not support an association between regular marijuana smoking and chronic COPD but do not exclude the possibility of other adverse respiratory effects.

Effects of Marijuana Smoking on Pulmonary Function and Respiratory Complications: A Systematic Review
Jeanette M. Tetrault, MD; Kristina Crothers, MD; Brent A. Moore, PhD; Reena Mehra, MD, MS; John Concato, MD, MS, MPH; David A. Fiellin, MD, Arch Intern Med. 2007;167:221-228.

Conclusions-Short-term exposure to marijuana is associated with bronchodilation. Physiologic data were inconclusive regarding an association between long-term marijuana smoking and airflow obstruction measures. Long-term marijuana smoking is associated with increased respiratory symptoms suggestive of obstructive lung disease.

School Psychology International, Vol. 20, No. 1, 23-37 (1999)
Effects of Marijuana on the Lung and its Defenses against Infection and Cancer,Donald P. Tashkin, Department of Medicine, UCLA School of Medicine, Los Angeles, USA.

Habitual marijuana use may lead to the following effects on the lung: (1) acute and chronic bronchitis; (2) extensive microscopic abnormalities in the cells lining the bronchial passages, some of which may be pre-malignant; (3) overexpression of molecular markers of progression to lung cancer in bronchial tissue; (4) abnormally increased accumulation of inflammatory cells (alveolar macrophages) in the lung; and (5) impairment in the function of these immune-effector cells (reduced ability to kill micro-organisms and tumour cells) and in their ability to produce protective inflammatory cytokines. Clinically, the major pulmonary consequences that may ensue from regular marijuana use are pulmonary infections and respiratory cancer. Infections of the lung are more likely in marijuana users due to a combination of smoking-related damage to the ciliated cells in the bronchial passages (the lung's first line of defense against inhaled micro-organisms) and marijuana-related impairment in the function of alveolar macrophages (the principal immune cells in the lung responsible for defending it against infection). Patients with pre-existing immune deficits due to AIDS or cancer chemotherapy might be expected to be particularly vulnerable to marijuana-related pulmonary infections. Furthermore, biochemical, cellular, genetic, animal and human studies all suggest that marijuana may be an important risk factor for the development of respiratory cancer. However, proof that habitual use of marijuana does in fact lead to respiratory cancer must await the results of well-designed case-control epidemiologic studies that should now be feasible after the passage of 30 years since the initiation of widespread marijuana use among young individuals in our society in the mid-1960s.


The truth here is that inhaling smoke from marijuana is potentially harmful to the respiratory system and you should take the time to fully examine the results of studies by reading the journal prior to forming conclusions especially if the study results are inconclusive.

THC prescribed to patients is not smoked, especially in cancer patients, it is taken orally for nausea and vomiting along with other agents.

Injected THC have shown good anti tumor response in mice with lung cancer, there are new studies that will be performed to test these results in larger animals and if they are favorable then onto the human clinical trials. While I am well aware of some of the benefits of cannabis, in the recreational setting smoking marijuana has associated risks,which to me, are larger than the benefits.

Heavy habitual marijuana smoking does not cause an accelerated decline in FEV1 with age

You said it my friend.

FEV1: Forced Expiratory Volume in the first second. The volume of air that can be forced out in one second after taking a deep breath, an important measure of pulmonary function.

How about the millions of people dying each year of Tobacco smoking, and not even 1 person in HISTORY dying from :m: ?

If you think that getting smoke in your lungs is harmfull, then what about eating cannabis? It gets you a real good buzz as well.

"Clinically, the major pulmonary consequences that may ensue from regular marijuana use are pulmonary infections and respiratory cancer."

School Psychology International, Vol. 20, No. 1, 23-37 (1999)
Effects of Marijuana on the Lung and its Defenses against Infection and Cancer,Donald P. Tashkin, Department of Medicine, UCLA School of Medicine, Los Angeles, USA.


Actually I suppose not having COPD is great but it does not help you much when you have cancer, as smoking marijuana does increase your risk as does tobacco.Tobacco and marijuana can both contribute to disease and death but it is a risk factor, the disease is what actually causes death so I am not sure if enough studies have been completed on smoking marijuana that could conclusively determine what the statistical percentage of contribution to cancer and pulmonary infections. Tobacco is a bit easier to analyze as it is legal and most people will tell their physicians that they smoke tobacco, unlike marijuana.

I can not take THC as it has serious adverse effects for me but as with any agent/medication you run the risk of side effects which could cause complications.

I don´t believe in opinions when facts are presented:

LARGEST STUDY ON CANCER AND WEED EVER:

"Tashkin's study, funded by the National Institutes of Health's National Institute on Drug Abuse, involved 1,200 people in Los Angeles who had lung, neck or head cancer and an additional 1,040 people without cancer matched by age, sex and neighborhood.

They were all asked about their lifetime use of marijuana, tobacco and alcohol. The heaviest marijuana smokers had lighted up more than 22,000 times, while moderately heavy usage was defined as smoking 11,000 to 22,000 marijuana cigarettes. Tashkin found that even the very heavy marijuana smokers showed NO increased incidence of the three cancers studied."

Source:

By Marc Kaufman
Washington Post Staff Writer
Friday, May 26, 2006; A03

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/05/25/AR2006052501729_pf.html

So, when a study involving 2.240 subjects, half of them with cancer presents such results, you can only expect that you back up comments like:

"as smoking marijuana does increase your risk as does tobacco"

That is a lie that has been presented to you since the beggining of this so called "war on drugs". Noone in history, and we are talking more than 5.000 years here, has EVER died of marihuana smoking.

Technically speaking no one has died from smoking tobacco either, it is a contributing risk and factor but not a cause of death. I will post a death certificate if you would like as a source showing that cause of death is never tobacco smoking but the actual disease which caused the death.

Here is one supporting document that proves that it affects epithelial cells.
J Physiol Lung Cell Mol Physiol 290: January 13, 2006. Inhaled marijuana smoke disrupts mitochondrial energetics in pulmonary epithelial cells in vivo
Theodore A. Sarafian, Nancy Habib, Michael Oldham, Navindra Seeram, Ru-Po Lee, Laura Lin, Donald P. Tashkin, and Michael D. Roth

Division of Pulmonary and Critical Care and Center for Human Nutrition, Department of Medicine, David Geffen School of Medicine at UCLA, Los Angeles; and 3Department of Community and Environmental Medicine, University of California, Irvine, California

http://ajplung.physiology.org/cgi/content/full/290/6/L1202

I find it interesting that the references you keep quoting are not directly from the source journal but pieces of media reports. They do not include all the data which may vary your opinion after reading the full text. I can post the original article if you can not gain access to it as I have journal access.

Just google "Tashkin's study", it was funded by the National Institutes of Health's National Institute on Drug Abuse.

For that one population study there are many published which offer biological evidence, the study you refer to is a population study here is a an excerpt from the conclusion of the Tashkin study, "Our results may have been affected by selection bias or error in measuring lifetime exposure and confounder histories"

here are the results of a biological study which he also performed:
Smoked marijuana as a cause of lung injury.


Tashkin DP.

Division of Pulmonary & Critical Care Medicine, Department of Medicine, David Geffen School of Medicine, UCLA, Los Angeles, CA 90095-1690, USA. dtashkin@mednet.ucla.edu

In many societies, marijuana is the second most commonly smoked substance after tobacco. While delta9-tetrahydrocannabinol (THC) is unique to marijuana and nicotine to tobacco, the smoke of marijuana, like that of tobacco, consists of a toxic mixture of gases and particulates, many of which are known to be harmful to the lung. Although far fewer marijuana than tobacco cigarettes are generally smoked on a daily basis, the pulmonary consequences of marijuana smoking may be magnified by the greater deposition of smoke particulates in the lung due to the differing manner in which marijuana is smoked. Whereas THC causes modest short-term bronchodilation, regular marijuana smoking produces a number of long-term pulmonary consequences, including chronic cough and sputum, histopathologic evidence of widespread airway inflammation and injury and immunohistochemical evidence of dysregulated growth of respiratory epithelial cells, that may be precursors to lung cancer. The THC in marijuana could contribute to some of these injurious changes through its ability to augment oxidative stress, cause mitochondrial dysfunction, and inhibit apoptosis. On the other hand, physiologic, clinical or epidemiologic evidence that marijuana smoking may lead to chronic obstructive pulmonary disease or respiratory cancer is limited and inconsistent. Habitual use of marijuana is also associated with abnormalities in the structure and function of alveolar macrophages, including impairment in microbial phagocytosis and killing that is associated with defective production of immunostimulatory cytokines and nitric oxide, thereby potentially predisposing to pulmonary infection. In view of the growing interest in medicinal marijuana, further epidemiologic studies are needed to clarify the true risks of regular marijuana smoking on respiratory health.

another one:
J Clin Pharmacol. 2002 Nov;42(11 Suppl):71S-81S.Click here to read Links
Respiratory and immunologic consequences of marijuana smoking.

* Tashkin DP,
* Baldwin GC,
* Sarafian T,
* Dubinett S,
* Roth MD.

Deportment of Medicine, UCLA School of Medicine, 90095-1690, USA.

Habitual smoking of marijuana has a number of effects on the respiratory and immune systems that may be clinically relevant. These include alterations in lung function ranging from no to mild airflow obstruction without evidence of diffusion impairment, an increased prevalence of acute and chronic bronchitis, striking endoscopic findings of airway injury (erythema, edema, and increased secretions) that correlate with histopathological alterations in bronchial biopsies, and dysregulated growth of the bronchial epithelium associated with altered expression of nuclear and cytoplasmic proteins involved in the pathogenesis of bronchogenic carcinoma. Other consequences of regular marijuana use include ultrastructual abnormalities in human alveolar macrophages along with impairment of their cytokine production, antimicrobial activity, and tumoricidal function. Cannabinoid receptor expression is altered in leukocytes collected from the blood of chronic smokers, and experimental models support a role for delta9-tetrahydrocannabinol in suppressing T cell function and cell-mediated immunity. The potential for marijuana smoking to predispose to the development of respiratory malignancy is suggested by several lines of evidence, including the presence of potent carcinogens in marijuana smoke and their resulting deposition in the lung, the occurrence of premalignant changes in bronchial biopsies obtained from smokers of marijuana in the absence of tobacco, impairment of antitumor immune defenses by delta9-tetrahydrocannabinol, and several clinical case series in which marijuana smokers were disproportionately over represented among young individuals who developed upper or lower respiratory tract cancer. Additional well designed epidemiological and immune monitoring studies are required to determine the potential causal relationship between marijuana use and the development of respiratory infection and/or cancer.

Please note he is also a co-author of the citation I previously posted above. I can also cite articles by other researchers which confirm the damage at cellular levels which increase the risk of cancer.

Faerynght, are you aware that the results you just showed us does not state:
- When was this study?
- Where was the study performed?
- Who were the subjects?
- What were the methods used for measure?
- How many subjects were tested?
- What were the population circumstances?

Government reports to keep brainwashing people are going to remain the same as long as this "war on people" continues; but they cannot do anything against we conscious people, that cannot be brainwashed so easily as in previous generations due to the lack of information.

Wisdom_Seeker-
The articles I referenced are all correctly cited, I only posted the abstracts, I have cited the journal, the authors, the volume, date and page number. They are not government reports they are medical journal articles, not bits and pieces but the full study results in peer reviewed well established international journals with all the information you requested.

For that one population study there are many published which offer biological evidence, the study you refer to is a population study here is a an excerpt from the conclusion of the Tashkin study, "Our results may have been affected by selection bias or error in measuring lifetime exposure and confounder histories"
This conclusion is from the study that you cited, as I pointed out earlier you can take bits and pieces for from a study and put it in a media article but you can not make an informed opinion until you read the full study and often more than one study is needed.

The study you referenced was a population study which the investigators also stated in the conclusion that there may be flaws in the study, really when you think of it a population of 2.240 of which only approximately 1200 people in the LA area were used. Here are some lung and bronchus cancer statistics for the U.S.
CA Cancer J Clin 2005; 55:10-30
© 2005 American Cancer Society
Cancer Statistics, 2005
Ahmedin Jemal, DVM, PhD, Taylor Murray, Elizabeth Ward, PhD, Alicia Samuels, MPH, Ram C. Tiwari, PhD, Asma Ghafoor, MPH, Eric J. Feuer, PhD and Michael J. Thun, MD, MS

Estimated new cancer diagnosis for lung and bronchus Male: 93010; Female: 79560. Estimated lung and bronchus cancer deaths: Male: 90490; Female: 73,020. These are just national statistics from 2005, international statistics are much higher, I did not even include Head and Neck Cancer stats. on diagnosis and mortality.

I am sorry I did not post the full citation for the first abstract, here you go...
Tashkin DP.

Division of Pulmonary & Critical Care Medicine, Department of Medicine, David Geffen School of Medicine, UCLA, Los Angeles, CA 90095-1690, USA. dtashkin@mednet.ucla.edu

Monaldi Arch Chest Dis. 2005 Jun;63(2):93-100.

My point is that if you read something in the media, research the subject in depth from established sources, not the Washington Post or government agencies for example. Realize that many studies need larger national studies with broader patient populations to have conclusive, accurate data outcomes. Lung cancer is a hard patient population to work with as well due to the pathology of the cancer, lack of early detection, mortality rates, and median survival rates. For example, many patients with Non-small Cell Lung Cancer (NSCLC), Stage IV disease present with distant metastatic disease to liver, brain, and bone (this determines the staging of disease). The median survival rate in this patient population is 5-7 months. The recurrence even with surgery and treatment is generally 5 years. The median survival rate for Extensive Small Cell Lung Cancer (SCLC) is 7-11 months and 20 months at the limited stage. I can not cite any journals as the information comes from so many sources, easily verified on-line and this is a patient population that I have been actively involved with.

So breathing smoke is bad for you. Duh! Breathing marijuana smoke is clearly not as bad for you as breathing tobacco smoke or auto exhaust but it probably isn't as good for you as clean mountain air.

Ask any old hippie. Many or perhaps most of the ones who don't smoke tobacco quit smoking pot years ago. They all make brownies or tea or alcohol infusions or are buying these new-fangled vaporizers from Amsterdam.

As for decline in cognitive abilities, all the pot heads I've tracked for decades are just as good at math, chess, computer programming and engineering as they ever were. The musicians, writers and visual artists are more creative and holistic. I won't give the pot credit for that (although they do) but it certainly hasn't been an impairment.

The one thing they all are is peaceful and easy to get along with. Slow to take offense and more interested in solving problems than causing them. Those are definitely the people I prefer to hire over the caffeine junkies who are impatient with everything and everybody, and alcohol junkies who go through withdrawal every morning.

Yes I know some lint-heads who have made messes of their lives and blame it on pot. Those are the ones who started in high school or even earlier. Children should not take drugs while their bodies, synapses, world view, disciplines and habits are forming. But ya know, it's really difficult to make that point when our entire society has been pandering caffeine to them since they were old enough to suck cola.

BTW, the study that started this thread was extensively reported in the Washington Post, with names, dates and all the proper citations. It's real and it's the best study of marijuana use that's been done since the War on Drugs made them impossible to do in America.

So breathing smoke is bad for you. Duh! Breathing marijuana smoke is clearly not as bad for you as breathing tobacco smoke or auto exhaust but it probably isn't as good for you as clean mountain air.

Ask any old hippie. Many or perhaps most of the ones who don't smoke tobacco quit smoking pot years ago. They all make brownies or tea or alcohol infusions or are buying these new-fangled vaporizers from Amsterdam.

As for decline in cognitive abilities, all the pot heads I've tracked for decades are just as good at math, chess, computer programming and engineering as they ever were. The musicians, writers and visual artists are more creative and holistic. I won't give the pot credit for that (although they do) but it certainly hasn't been an impairment.

The one thing they all are is peaceful and easy to get along with. Slow to take offense and more interested in solving problems than causing them. Those are definitely the people I prefer to hire over the caffeine junkies who are impatient with everything and everybody, and alcohol junkies who go through withdrawal every morning.

Yes I know some lint-heads who have made messes of their lives and blame it on pot. Those are the ones who started in high school or even earlier. Children should not take drugs while their bodies, synapses, world view, disciplines and habits are forming. But ya know, it's really difficult to make that point when our entire society has been pandering caffeine to them since they were old enough to suck cola.

BTW, the study that started this thread was extensively reported in the Washington Post, with names, dates and all the proper citations. It's real and it's the best study of marijuana use that's been done since the War on Drugs made them impossible to do in America.

I concur, I am, after all, a computer programmer (=

I do not think the Post did a poor job citing the article or with reporting on the findings, but unfortunately news media does not have enough print space to post the whole study and only highlights key points. The PI's of the study also stated in the conclusion that the study was potentially inaccurate in certain areas which the Post did not include in the article and I feel they should have mentioned. I have no problem with medicinal marijuana or testing for applicable uses or feel the study was not "real" . I just have an issue with taking one journal article, not reading the full study and concluding that smoking marijuana does not cause cancer. It is an informative study with qualified investigators, ideally a large national or international population study would be more conclusive. I think people being informed about risks and benefits of their health is important and it would be very unfortunate if people thought that based on this Post article that they can smoke marijuana and not be concerned with the risk of associated diseases.

I just have an issue with taking one journal article, not reading the full study and concluding that smoking marijuana does not cause cancer.

I did not only take one article, I have been reading about this stuff for more than 7 years, I did a 300 pages essay in High School, from Biology books on drugs.

Not 1 person has EVER died from marihuana smoking in history, not even the people that smoke it everyday for 30 years.

And it is a proven fact, that more than 100.000 die every year in US only from cancer due to Tabacco.There are 43 identified carcinogens in tobacco smoke. NONE in cannabis, only medicinal attributes.

How come modern science haven´t been able to prove ONE death due to marihuana smoking???? and they identify 100.000 deaths due to tobacco smoking every year.

I just look at the facts, the real ones.

Please site your references listing cause of death due to tobacco smoke, as I pointed out before that it is a contributing factor but not cause of death. No one you know will die from smoking marijuana they will die from the diseases associated with the contributing factor of inhaling smoke into their respiratory system.

Here are some more articles for you to research:
1: Am J Respir Cell Mol Biol. 2001 Mar;24(3):339-44.
Induction and regulation of the carcinogen-metabolizing enzyme CYP1A1 by marijuana smoke and delta (9)-tetrahydrocannabinol.

Roth MD, Marques-Magallanes JA, Yuan M, Sun W, Tashkin DP, Hankinson O.

Division of Pulmonary and Critical Care Medicine, Department of Pathology and Laboratory Medicine, UCLA School of Medicine, Los Angeles, California 90095-1690, USA. mroth@mednet.ucla.edu

Toxicol Lett. 2005 Aug 14;158(2):95-107. Epub 2005 Apr 26.
Gene expression changes in human small airway epithelial cells exposed to Delta9-tetrahydrocannabinol.

Sarafian T, Habib N, Mao JT, Tsu IH, Yamamoto ML, Hsu E, Tashkin DP, Roth MD.

Division of Pulmonary and Critical Care, Department of Medicine, 14-184 Warren Hall, David Geffen School of Medicine at UCLA, Los Angeles, CA 90095-1690, USA. tsarafian@mednet.ucla.edu

Arch Pharm Res. 2005 Dec;28(12):1365-75.
Antiestrogenic effects of marijuana smoke condensate and cannabinoid compounds.

Lee SY, Oh SM, Lee SK, Chung KH.

National Institute of Scientific Investigation, Seoul, Korea.

I also look at the facts, real scientific facts including pathological and gene expressions based on scientific research not moral or ethical aspects of this topic. I would never censor medical information in favor of political viewpoints. I am not concerned with the legal aspects just the health risks/benefits from a medicinal standpoint.

I will not continue this useless debate, you sources are fake, because the studies they performed, did not prove cancerogenous substances in weed. Give me a statement that says so, with a real link, and I will believe you.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cannabis_(drug)#Health_issues_and_the_effects_of_c annabis

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tobacco_smoking#Health_effects

They have a LOT of references, MJ does not cause cancer, Tobacco does.

Your right this debate should no longer continue...

My cited references are not fake, to imply that is rude and ignorant, all my references are easily obtainable through the journals cited or pubmed. I can understand some misunderstanding in the information contained in the journals, some of it may be difficult to comprehend if you are not used to perusing medical and scientific journals.

This is from the Wikipedia entry:
"Like tobacco smoke, cannabis smoke contains tars which are rich in carcinogenic polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons, which are a prime culprit in smoking-related cancers."
"An obvious way to protect smokers' health is therefore to minimize the content of smoke tars relative to cannabinoids."

I suggest you look at the conclusions specifically in references sited from the Wikipedia entry:
#35-Roth, et al. (1998)
#37-Hashibe, et al. (2005)
#42-Sydney. (1997)

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Health_issues_and_the_effects_of_cannabis

I am willing to read the whole article and research reference.

I am sorry if I was rude mate, please accept my humble apologies.

Lets not get into worthless word exchanging, and ambiguos studies.

Lets each believe what each choose to believe.

Peace.

How about the millions of people dying each year of Tobacco smoking, and not even 1 person in HISTORY dying from :m: ?

Sometimes when people die the family doesn't want how or why publicised, especially if it's down to their addictions. I can say that I had a GP once mention to me that he had to go deal with a coroner about a recent death and it was believed the death was directly related to cannabis usage.

There are then many deaths indirectly related from Gang wars or a pot heads in ability to remember the gas stove was on for the "hot knives" they'd been doing.

The best place for you to see the downfall of such drugs as cannabis is if you take a visit to a local psychiatric ward. Not all the people will be there with natural psychosis, in fact you'll find a high number there are drug related psychosis cases. Some might be harder drugs, while others will be reacting to cannabis.

Cannabis will causes psychiatric conditions like schizophrenia with prolonged exposure and high concentrations.

As for smoking it, Anything that burns will give of various chemicals. Smoke itself is a Carbon emission which is known to generate lung related conditions.

The following is a breakdown of the chemical composition of an Actual Cannabis plant based upon what's suggested for a healthy plant:

From:
http://www.marijuana-seeds.net/Marijuana-Fertilizer-Food-And-Nutrients-For-The-Marijuana-Plant.html

Nitrogen (N), Phosphorus(P), Potassium (K) = Good for roots
Calcium(Ca), Sulphur(S), Magnesium (Mg) = Good for photosynthesis
boron (5), copper (Cu), molybdenum (Mo), zinc (Zn), iron (Fe) and manganese (Mn)=Good for all round
Hydrogen (H), Carbon (C) and Oxygen (O) = From Water and the atmosphere.

Not all these chemicals are necessarily present in high concentrations within the bud and leaves, however they leave some interesting potentials for chemistry that can be created as exhaust when being burnt.

THC is chemically C21H30O2, you should be able to identify that it's a high concentration of C and H, which is the main component of a number of gases (Methane CH4, Benzene C6H6, Naphthalene C10H8 to name a few of the CxHx composites.)

Obviously smoking THC alone is going to be similar to breathing in such gases in a small concentrations, along with Carbon Dioxide (CO2) and of course Carbon Monoxide (CO). However this isn't were the chemistry stops...

For instance lets take one of the chemicals suggested for photosynthesis, Sulphur (S) and combine that with Hydrogen (H) so we end up with Hydrogen sulfide (H2S) you might like to check the wiki entry, specifically the SAFETY section on this chemical composite considering in high concentrations it can be a silent killer.

Other ones would include Hydrogen Cyanide (HCN), Nitrogen Monoxide/Dioxide etc (NOx) and well I'm sure there are many other chemical composites that you'll have heard of which are all equally poisonous.

So Conclusion:
Cannabis is not healthy when smoked since combustion cause some chemistry changes in regards to intake.

Also note that the chemical concentrations will be different on a plant by plant basis.

Yes yes, we all know that inhaling smoke is not very good for you. That point has been made and certified. We also all know there are lots of ways to get THC into your body without burning it. People who smoke tobacco will smoke their marijuana and it probably won't make more than a slight statistical difference in their health. People who don't smoke tobacco find better ways to enjoy their marijuana.

As for psychosis, doesn't anybody do risk analysis in this place? It is so damn frustrating. You throw anecdotal data out with no numbers, or at best numbers with no context, and let people draw conclusions based on their feelings. That is no way to inform anyone.

There are tens of millions of people in America who have used marijuana. The number may be a hundred million by now, we may never know. What infinitesimal fraction of those people ever saw the inside of a psych ward? Are we really supposed to curtail the rights of tens of millions of people because a few hundred of them (just pulling a number out of the air but it can hardly be any greater than that) might go crazy? That's the logic of the Nanny State!

There are tens of millions of people in America who have used marijuana. The number may be a hundred million by now, we may never know. What infinitesimal fraction of those people ever saw the inside of a psych ward? Are we really supposed to curtail the rights of tens of millions of people because a few hundred of them (just pulling a number out of the air but it can hardly be any greater than that) might go crazy? That's the logic of the Nanny State!

Thats the same sort of mentality the gun lobbyist's use.

I have to admit people that smoke pot rarely identify the flaws of it, in fact they are usually pro-activist lobbyist's suggesting what a wonderful weed it is, however they never contemplate how the world perceives them, how useful they are at work or how their education suffers.

I know how the substance effects moods and how people deal with situations, after all the drug usage itself is escapism unless there is a truly medical reason for usage. (Of which there have only really been trials.)

As for the evidence being anecdotal, Doctors would disagree as they have access to patients records in regards to their ailments, unfortunately though they can't talk about individual cases and identify the individuals since that would go against their code of conduct.

not only their education, but their motivation can drop severely too (I've witnessed that first hand)

Well, stereotyping is not good, not even if it is about potheads. I smoked my way through college and got a degree in Computer Science, I went to classes high, and I enjoy programming while high, there is better focus on what you are doing, and even more productivity. I used to sit in my computer for a whole night without stopping, finishing in one week what it was appointed to do in 4 months for the class. A lot of my classmates looked down on people who smoked, so I did not tell them I smoked, and they even looked up to me cause of my grades and skills in logistics and programming. If they knew I smoked and got better grades than them they would have dropped in their backs. I remember a day when I went to a "IT dept. administration" class higher than ever, and I realized there was a test. I didn´t study at all, I just sat there relaxed, and got one of the higher scores, this was one of the last courses of the career.
After 7 years of smoking and 2 succesfull jobs, I met my wife, and she doesn´t smoke it. My motivation now is higher than ever, and I have never had any mental problems or motivational issues. I have always been a very happy person, maybe cause I lived in the beach until I was 17, and used to be a surfer (=. Or maybe that has nothing to do with this, I just know I´m happy.

I don´t smoke it now, cause of my wife, but I do keep a big bottle of weed oil for cooking, and it is very good indeed...

So what can you say to me about cannabis for me to stop using? That would be the million dollar question, I mean, I have been a heavy smoker for 7 years, what effects should I be having by now?

PS:I´m single-handling an Informatics project right now, it is an application for a multi-national casino company, so my skills have not been affected by this.

Hypothetically it's very easy to paint a perfect picture, you just leave out all the imperfections.

There is a lot of details missing, ranging from the type you use to smoke, what you class as heavy smoking and whether you have tried other drugs. On top of that there could then be questions raised about if you are on any medication as some can lessen some of the issues caused.

But there is most definitely one thing very noticeable by your post, you are a complete advocate of the weed, don't you find that a little odd? I mean your advocation suggests addiction, which the obvious response from a person that is such an advocate is: you can live without it and you aren't hooked, since cannabis isn't addictive (Which is the usual rhetoric)

You'll also find that most people that suffer psychosis from cannabis don't take care of themselves very well, namely they might not eat as much as they should or sleep as much as they should and the outcome resembles a breakdown. Of course your likely not fall to that category because you have someone that is important to your life with which you'll maintain a relationship equilibrium. (After all if you didn't have a shower for 5-6 days, what would your wife do?)

Thats the same sort of mentality the gun lobbyist's use.As a big-L and small-l libertarian I'm also a defender of the Second Amendment, even though I've never owned a gun and am somewhat uncomfortable around them. You've just clearly identified yourself as an advocate of the Nanny State. Please go live someplace like Japan or Germany where everyone loves to let the government make all of their choices for them, and let their lives be ruled by risk analyses prepared by bungling civil servants. You're in the wrong country.I have to admit people that smoke pot rarely identify the flaws of it, in fact they are usually pro-activist lobbyist's suggesting what a wonderful weed it is, however they never contemplate how the world perceives them, how useful they are at work or how their education suffers.I am part of that world and I perceive many of them to be highly useful at work. As I said above, which you conveniently skipped over, I prefer the non-competitive, non-argumentative, imagination-driven potheads to the general population in my own workforce.I know how the substance effects moods and how people deal with situations, after all the drug usage itself is escapism unless there is a truly medical reason for usage.Once again you conveniently ignore facts--or at least testimony--that conflicts with your opinion. I have known many musicians and other artists who found marijuana helpful to their careers. If you insist on belittling it as "escapism," perhaps you could say that it helps them escape from their distractions so they can concentrate on what they are trying to do.(Of which there have only really been trials.)Yes, I am familiar with the "trials." The damned-to-hell DEA and FBI have actually arrested medical marijuana patients in my state and jailed them without access to their medicine. They have closed clinics as a way of showing California that no state can win a leg-lifting contest with the damned-to-hell federal government, no matter what a majority of its citizens consider reasonable. And it's people like you who make this possible.As for the evidence being anecdotal, Doctors would disagree as they have access to patients records in regards to their ailments, unfortunately though they can't talk about individual cases and identify the individuals since that would go against their code of conduct.In other words, your so-called "evidence" is also anecdotal. You have no actual observations, experiences, or even trustworthy records from which to draw your conclusions. It's hearsay and we all know what that's worth. I've at least personally observed the performance of marijuana users on the job and in other facets of their lives.

You seem determined to establish "drug" use as "escapism" and therefore devoid of any "value" according to your own value system--since you don't seem to regard good old fashioned unwinding-from-your-crappy-job fun as a value. So which "drugs" are we talking about here? Virtually the entire population of this country uses caffeine. They use it to "escape" from the realities of their life: depression, exhaustion, inattention. Are they "escapists" too? The Mormons seem to think so, they lump it in with alcohol, tobacco, and all the illicit drugs. I personally have to treat it as a dangerous drug because I am exceptionally sensitive to it, I am easily addicted to it, and my behavior becomes unacceptable when I'm high on it. I first learned this about forty years ago when someone let it slip that caffeine is actually a drug and cola is full of the stuff, and forty years later I'm still a recovering caffeine addict.

Have you found a convoluted logic path that allows you to differentiate yourself from the Mormons, or are you being true to yourself and standing out there preaching against caffeine as well? I'll bet that makes you a lot of friends. :)

Even more reason to love and cherish cannabis :D :m: :)

Hello all

To me cannabis sativa is a medicinal drug, food source, and an industrial textile source. With mans ability to selectively breed for a desired effect the medicinal drug variety of cannabis is no longer the same as the industrial textile source. The amount of THC in the current textile varieties is such that you could not smoke enough to get high.

This brings up the question of why the textile varieties are not being used. While the abuse of any type of drug is not to be condoned the non-use of a natural resource in this day and age could be considered criminal.

All you need to due to find out why cannabis sativa was made illegal is to follow the money trail of who financed the production of the propaganda films used to brainwash the public into supporting a bill that made cannabis illegal. I am old enough to remember some of those films that where shown to me in grade school. Talk about being politically incorrect.

While I have never personally used cannabis (marijuana) I resent the fact of being told that I or anyone else can't use it for medical reasons.

Without hemp there might have never been a USA since that was how landowners paid taxes to and help finance the early government. It was easy and cost effective to grow.

:)

I agree that the tobacco industry is obviously against marijane, and that tobacco must be banned while pot should be legalized.... specially for eating!

I haven’t bothered to read the whole post because it was started by someone who extols that....

We should DARE to speak the TRUTH no matter what the law is.


:rolleyes:

Translation: Internet crackpot who conveniently and selectively cherry-picks seemingly supportive science to rationalize and excuse their own drug taking.


Anyhoo, I read this in the journal Science and thought it was very interesting. It has long been known that smoking marijuana during pregnancy results in defects in brain development in the unborn child resulting in permanent cognitive deficits. However, the mechanism has never been fully discovered.

Now Berghuis et al. report that natural cannabinoids in the developing CNS act as repulsive guidance cues for GABAergic axons. In simple terms, endogenous cannabinoids provide developmental cues that direct the formation of neuronal connections during brain development. If an idiot mother smokes marijuana, the exogenous cannabinoids that floods her blood stream also enters the foetus’s blood stream and interferes with this normal process. These findings define the cellular context through which prenatal marijuana use perturbs brain development.

Citation:

Hardwiring the Brain: Endocannabinoids Shape Neuronal Connectivity
Berghuis et al.
Science 25 May 2007:
Vol. 316. no. 5828, pp. 1212 - 1216

The roles of endocannabinoid signaling during central nervous system development are unknown. We report that CB1 cannabinoid receptors (CB1Rs) are enriched in the axonal growth cones of -aminobutyric acid–containing (GABAergic) interneurons in the rodent cortex during late gestation. Endocannabinoids trigger CB1R internalization and elimination from filopodia and induce chemorepulsion and collapse of axonal growth cones of these GABAergic interneurons by activating RhoA. Similarly, endocannabinoids diminish the galvanotropism of Xenopus laevis spinal neurons. These findings, together with the impaired target selection of cortical GABAergic interneurons lacking CB1Rs, identify endocannabinoids as axon guidance cues and demonstrate that endocannabinoid signaling regulates synaptogenesis and target selection in vivo.

Translation: Internet crackpot who conveniently and selectively cherry-picks seemingly supportive science to rationalize and excuse their own drug taking.

NO not cherry picks, just go to wikipedia.

Thanks for the insults, they are of help.

Last edited by samcdkey : Yesterday at 08:32 AM. Reason: maintaining seriousness of thread
:D:D

Anyhoo, I read this in the journal Science and thought it was very interesting. It has long been known that smoking marijuana during pregnancy results in defects in brain development in the unborn child resulting in permanent cognitive deficits. However, the mechanism has never been fully discovered.
The problem with smoking during pregnancy lies primarily on the limitation of oxigen that it imposes on the foetus. And, yes, such limitation can cause brain abnormalities, particularly if the mother smoked durinf the first half of the first trimester (although smoking regularly in ANY part of the pregnancy decreases the amount of oxygen that reaches the foetus).

Oh... and, of course, pot only reduces the amount of oxygen, while cigarretes also give tons of toxins to the babies.... :bugeye:

The problem with smoking during pregnancy lies primarily on the limitation of oxigen that it imposes on the foetus. And, yes, such limitation can cause brain abnormalities, particularly if the mother smoked durinf the first half of the first trimester (although smoking regularly in ANY part of the pregnancy decreases the amount of oxygen that reaches the foetus).

Oh... and, of course, pot only reduces the amount of oxygen, while cigarretes also give tons of toxins to the babies.... :bugeye:

Obviously you ignored my post, the same toxin's are present in cannabis.

Oh... and, of course, pot only reduces the amount of oxygen....


Wrong. I even posted a paper that demonstrates you're wrong, yet somehow you've managed to miss it despite it being the sole point of the post! :bugeye:

NO not cherry picks, just go to wikipedia.

A rigorous source of peer-reviewed info. :rolleyes:

Thanks for the insults, they are of help.

I'm sorry, I intended to be merely a bit sarcastic rather than outright insulting. :)

Cannabis has a whole different set of chemicals, compared to cigaretes...

Explain why you think this, TruthSeeker?

A lot of the chemicals come from burning and incompletely burning plant matter. What difference is it if the plant material is marijuana or tobacco?

[QUOTE=Idle Mind;1427448]Explain why you think this, TruthSeeker?

I feel personally insulted by this, advocate of tobacco?
I will only paste data attibuted to the "U.S. Department of Health and Human Services.", government official results:

Tobacco:

- Tobacco is highly addictive because of nicotine, the withdrawal symptoms occur 30 minutes after the latest dose, causing confusion, restlessness, anxiety, insomnia, and dysphoria.

- Nicotine also disturbs metabolism and suppresses appetite.

- Secondhand smoke contains more than 50 cancer-causing agents (carcinogens), and is responsible each year for an estimated 3,000 lung cancer deaths and more than 35,000 coronary heart disease deaths among nonsmokers in the United States.

http://www.cdc.gov/tobacco/data_statistics/MMWR/2004/mm5350_highlights.htm

- causes about 90% of lung cancer deaths in women and almost 80% of lung cancer deaths in men.

- causes cancers of the bladder, oral cavity, pharynx, larynx (voice box), esophagus, cervix, kidney, lung, pancreas, and stomach, and causes acute myeloid leukemia.

- causes coronary heart disease, the leading cause of death in the United States.

- causes reduced circulation by narrowing the blood vessels (arteries). Smokers are more than 10 times as likely as nonsmokers to develop peripheral vascular disease

- causes abdominal aortic aneurysm.

- About 90% of all deaths from chronic obstructive lung diseases are attributable to cigarette smoking.

- early childhood effects, including an increased risk for infertility, preterm delivery, stillbirth, low birth weight, and sudden infant death syndrome (SIDS).

http://www.cdc.gov/tobacco/data_statistics/Factsheets/health_effects.htm
http://www.mydr.com.au/default.asp?article=4215#

"The primary carcinogens are the pyrolysis products of tobacco leaves. It, contains polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons, particularly benzopyrene. The mechanism of their carcinogenity is well-known: oxidation produces an epoxide, which binds to DNA covalently and distorts it. If the cell cannot repair its DNA damage prior to undergoing mitotic division, the daughter cells carry a greater risk becoming tumorgenic. DNA damage is one of the causes of cancer, because if the poison damages the programmed cell death system severely enough (usually requiring more than one mutation), damaged cells cannot kill themselves and begin to divide uncontrollably. This results in the formation of tumors than have the potential of becoming cancerous. This results in an essentially random occurrence of cancer, where the probability increases with increasing exposure. In this respect, the mechanism of carcinogenicity closely resembles that of mustard gas, aflatoxin and other DNA alkylating agents.

Tobacco smoke also contains various carcinogens other than polynuclear aromatic hydrocarbons, such as traces of radioactive elements. Smoking is therefore an important route of exposure to the dangerous ionizing radiation. The carcinogenity of tobacco is aggravated by the delivery of the carcinogens, namely direct inhalation. Radioactive and carcinogenic particles would not find their way by itself to the lungs, but a smoker inhales them repeatedly over a long period of time.

The carcinogenity of tobacco smoke is not explained by nicotine per se, which is not carcinogenic or mutagenic. However, it inhibits apoptosis, therefore accelerating existing cancers. Also, NNK, a nicotine derivative converted from nicotine, can be carcinogenic."

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tobacco_smoking#Health_effects

MARIHUANA:
A study published in 2006 by Donald Tashkin of the University of California, Los Angeles, the largest study of its kind, concluded there is no link between smoking cannabis and lung cancer.
(Original post)

I better leave you to read the original post, it contains almost everything regarding this subject.

I want to add, I didn´t used to smoke weed when I was in HS, after I did a 1 year research on all the biology books on the subject at my disposal, I got to the conclusion that the damaging aspect is all BS. I made a 300 pages essay on health effects of cannabis. And let me tell you man, is all good.

It may make you a little lazy during 72 hours of the last dose, but thats about it.

A lot of the chemicals come from burning and incompletely burning plant matter. What difference is it if the plant material is marijuana or tobacco?So... don't smoke it. That's the same advice I give everybody who considers smoking pot or is already doing it. I don't really care whether it's true that it's healthier for you than tobacco. I just can't believe that inhaling smoke is good for you. Maybe it doesn't cause fatal lung cancer, but long-term use has definitely created breathing problems for some people I know. Who needs that?

If you want to get high, there are plenty of other ways to do it without inhaling smoke.It may make you a little lazy during 72 hours of the last dose, but thats about it.Physically lazy is what I have observed, but not mentally so. It appears to enhance some people's ability to focus. I've seen people play marathons of chess and go into a frenzy of songwriting or painting. Some say that it inhibits left-brain activity and allows more creative processes to dominate thought. This would suggest that it might be better for left-brained logical people, to give them a more balanced outlook for a few hours, than it would for people who are already right-brained. And I have to admit it seems to be less of a problem for highly intelligent people who can stand to lose a few IQ points and still cope with real life, than for average folk.

I.e., probably okay for Bill Clinton. He could still analyze foreign affairs, perhaps with more insight, and he could still play the saxophone. But a disaster for George Bush. He would forget how to use the bathroom. :)

If you want to get high, there are plenty of other ways to do it without inhaling smoke.

Yeap, I no longer smoke it like I used to, now I make special cookies. To be honest, my wife does the cookies, she likes to cook, she wants to be a chef; and her cookies are like 10 times better than mine. She spoils me :p

Physically lazy is what I have observed, but not mentally so. It appears to enhance some people's ability to focus. I've seen people play marathons of chess and go into a frenzy of songwriting or painting. Some say that it inhibits left-brain activity and allows more creative processes to dominate thought. This would suggest that it might be better for left-brained logical people, to give them a more balanced outlook for a few hours, than it would for people who are already right-brained. And I have to admit it seems to be less of a problem for highly intelligent people who can stand to lose a few IQ points and still cope with real life, than for average folk.

I.e., probably okay for Bill Clinton. He could still analyze foreign affairs, perhaps with more insight, and he could still play the saxophone. But a disaster for George Bush. He would forget how to use the bathroom. :)

Yes you are right. I have observed that while high, you just don´t do the things you don´t like to do. So if you don´t like your job, weed is probably not going to help you to get it done.

I personally like programming, my job, and I have noticed weed helps me focus on the job. I am far more productive while high, because I enjoy it like if I was playing a video game.

On the other hand, if I have to help clean the house, weed is probably not that helpful for me, it makes me lazy in that department.

I think this is different from person to person.

It is like Bob Marley said: "When you smoke weed it reveals you to yourself."

Yes. Once I smoked a lot of weed and I found something fascinating about myself.

I'm often seen as a very shy quiet guy. The fact is- that is simply not true. What happens is that I'm simply not listened to. Basically, when I talk with people, instead of listening to me they either turn to their own minds or they listen to someone else. They focus on something else when I'm talking. So, basically, to their knowledge, I haven't said a word! At the same time, when they say something and change subject, I pay attention to what they say and forgot what I was saying. So, to me, as well, I didn't say anything!!! My thoughts are simply lost into oblivion because nobody, including me, care to listen!!! :eek:

In fact, I notice it has always been like that. I talk and nobody ever listens.... :(