Cannabis 'worse than tobacco'

BBC News ^ | 10 July 2002

[SheLion]

Cannabis poses a greater threat to health than tobacco, lung experts have warned.

The warning comes on the day that Home Secretary David Blunkett is due to make a Commons statement about the future of government drug policy.

Many young people are simply not aware that smoking cannabis may put them at increased risk of respiratory cancers and infections .

Dame Helena Shovelton:

The Home Affairs Select Committee has recommended that cannabis is downgraded from a class B drug to class C. This would mean that possession would lead to a caution, rather than arrest.

The British Lung Foundation is currently carrying out a review of research into the impact of smoking cannabis on health.

Preliminary results suggest that the drug is at least as harmful as smoking tobacco - and may carry a higher risk of some respiratory cancers.

Ignorance

BLF chief executive Dame Helena Shovelton said: "Many young people are simply not aware that smoking cannabis may put them at increased risk of respiratory cancers and infections.

"The government spends millions of pounds a year on smoking cessation and public education about the dangers of smoking, yet smoking cannabis is at least as harmful as smoking tobacco and, indeed, may carry a higher risk of some respiratory cancers."

She said regardless of cannabis's legal status, many young people will make their own decision about whether they wish to use it or not.

"The government have a public health responsibility to ensure they do so with full knowledge of the risks associated with smoking cannabis," she said.

"Fifty years ago, people thought smoking was a good thing. Now it is described as a public health disaster - we don't want to see the same thing happen with cannabis."

Under estimate:

The report is also expected to warn that research carried out in the 1960s and 1970s may underestimate the impact of today's cannabis since it is much more potent than the cannabis smoked then.

The average cannabis cigarette smoked in the 1960s contained about 10mg of D9-tetrahydrocannabinol (THC), the ingredient which accounts for the psychoactive properties of cannabis, compared to 150mg of THC today.

British Lung Foundation chairman Dr Mark Britton said: "There is an urgent need for more research into the effects of cannabis on respiratory health so that we can feel confident in the advice we give to young people.

"As a respiratory consultant physician, I see the devastating consequences of smoking-related lung diseases, such as emphysema and chronic obstructive airways diseases, every day and I am fearful that long-term cannabis smoking may be linked to similar conditions."

[TheOtherOne]

Most pot smokers already smoke in private or with other smokers and do not subject others in public to their smoke.

Have you been to a Rock concert at any time during the past 35 years? ;-)

Again, I say, "Most pot smokers already smoke in private or with other smokers . . . (See, I have been to a concert ; )

Okay, I admit there are some 'subjected' to the smoke who probably aren't smokers.

[concerned about politics]

Alot of it is purely psychological

I've done both before. Tobacco and pot while in school. I think both are fine if used as a social type thing. I wouldn't recommend 18 wheel truck driving, though.
The brownies were the best because the buz is not so brain deadening and the taste is awful - the chocolate helps to cover that.
The old Mexican was pretty weak stuff, and the joint had to be the size of a cigar. That was best for brownies.
I've had stuff from Canada (Canadian skunk) that when used in a one hitter only took about 2 good hits and it was enough. If you did anymore, you'd have to ask what year it was!

[shempy]

Maybe if we forced bulls to smoke weed we could double milk production.

[hauerf]

Legalize it and require sellers to put the appropriate warning on the side of the pack. Then, caveat emptor.

[monkeyshine]

They've actually been around for a few years now. I have a friend who is an insane pot head. He's a "wake and bake". Been so for almost all of the 15 years I've known him. He had a vaporizer at least 5 years ago. It was kind of a crude device - looks like a crystal ball, with a hose coming out of the bottom. I think there are newer devices.

I wonder if this is anything like those smokeless cigarettes they tried to come out with a few years ago. Vaporizing the tabacco might be a lot healthier for addicted smokers. Maybe the nicotine will still cause other complications like heart disease... but at least the lung risk might be reduced, as well as second hand smoke issues.

[steve-b]

yet smoking cannabis is at least as harmful as smoking tobacco

Well, then, don't smoke it. Try Alice B. Toklas' brownie recipe instead. ;-)

[DumpsterDiver]

Furthermore, cannabis doesn't need to be smoked at all to obtain the effect - it can be baked into brownies and eaten ...

I'd like to suggest baking it in with cupcakes rather than brownies. Add the pot after pouring out the batter. Doing it that way makes it easier to regulate how much pot you ingest.

[Dakmar]

Then there was the infamous TULANE STUDY using rhesus monkeys.

[shempy]

The brownies were the best because the buz is not so brain deadening and the taste is awful - the chocolate helps to cover that.

10 years ago I had a bad brownie experience. I didn't know how much weed I should use, so I used an ounce - for one small pan of brownies. I ate one and went out to eat with some friends. About 40 minutes later - WOOOOMSHH - it came on like a big wave. Suddenly I was not fit to be in public. The next day I cut the rest of the brownies in real small pieces.

[Wolfie]

Actually, the best way is to make butter out of the marijuana first, then use the butter as an ingredient. Or so I've heard.

[Billthedrill]

She said regardless of cannabis's legal status, many young people will make their own decision about whether they wish to use it or not.

Why do I get the impression that she thinks that young people making their own decisions is a bad thing?

Pot burns hotter than tobacco, but you smoke much, much less of it. But it's still smoking. Based on - ahem - extensive personal research I'd guess it's less carcinogenic than tobacco due primarily to dosage, but that its health risks are not zero, and not just cancer-related, smoking anything tends to increase blood pressure and put exotic organic compounds onto skin whose reactions vary from individual to individual but which are occasionally detrimental.

Is it as "harmful" as tobacco? Well, tobacco isn't necessarily "harmful" to everyone, so blanket statements such as this are not necessarily that helpful to debate. Is it risk-free to everyone? I doubt that seriously. Will there be social costs associated with legalization? I think that is inevitable. Will these be worse than the social costs we're paying to support the WOD? My personal belief is that they will not be, but they won't be zero.

And no, I don't smoke the stuff any more.

[SheLion]

Most pot smokers already smoke in private or with other smokers and do not subject others in public to their smoke.

Shoot! Why not? Could be a cheap high for us. heh!

[TheOtherOne]

Actually, the best way is to make butter out of the marijuana first, then use the butter as an ingredient. Or so I've heard.

Since the THC is fat soluble, is can be sauteed or otherwise induced into butter. Then any recipie could be used with the new enhanced butter.

[Wolfie]

Yep...although you kinda have to get used to green butter. Or so I've heard.

[Billthedrill]

It kinda looks like thyme butter. I, uh, read it in USA Today, yeah, that's it...

[concerned about politics]

Furthermore, cannabis doesn't need to be smoked at all to obtain the effect - it can be baked into brownies and eaten ...

That would pretty much have to be the answer to the lung argument.
Tobacco smokers can smoke up to 2 packs per day, or 40 cigaretts. Imagine 40 joints a day! That certainly would increase the risk of lung problems!
Tobacco is poison and cannot be injested without toxins, pot can and isn't poison.
Although I feel it should be a social thing, like having a drink, I vote for eating it.

[shempy]

My favorite way to use weed for cooking is using acetone. You put the weed in a mason jar and pour acetone over it. Stir it up good until it turn dark dark green. Then pour it through a cheese cloth into a pyrex baking dish. Put the weed back in the mason jar and repeat until the acetone stays clear. Then have a fan pointed at the baking dish until the acetone evaporates. It leaves a hard blackish green sticky coating on the dish. Then just add corn oil to dissolve it. You can bake with this black oil in anything that requires corn oil.

[DonQ]

One of the important facts, evidently not considered in this study, is that tobacco smokers tend to smoke all day long (sometimes two and three full packs) and marijuana smokers tend to smoke only one or two reefers a day. The chemical content of the two substances has to be weighed against the amount actually consumed.

[Paulus Invictus]

Any smoke put into the lungs is known to be detrimental to one's health. Fire fighters who breath lots of smoke during their careers often fall ill with lung problems years later. The alveoli that exchange gases in our lungs are extremely delicate and easily damaged.

That cigarrette smoke is harmful is obvious. All you need is to see is a set of human lungs of a dead smoker. I saw a pair of tar-blackened, cancerous lungs in a hospital morgue once and decided then and there never to smoke. The physician that showed us the torso and lungs said the victim had smoked for 25 years and that was his death penalty at age 40. While he explained the case to us, the doc was smoking.

[NoLongerLurker]

This article is pure bullsh!t.

No one smokes 10-20 marijuana cigarettes a day like the 1-2 pack a day cigarette smokers who damage their lungs and get cancer.

Marijuana ought to be legalized and sold in a controlled fashion like alchohol. It is, on the whole, probably less dangerous than alchohol. I've never heard of a person DYING from using marijuana; it must be pretty rare (more than 100,000 people a year die from alchohol related diseases and accidents). It doesn't even increase their auto accident rate (they just slow down).

I don't use marijuana. But I don't like the enormous criminality and corruption that follows from its being illegal. It's just like what happened during Prohibition. The corruption and crime are worse than anything the drug does.