Marijuana is BAD For You: General Health

Ziggy · **Site Rank:** Healthy BBF

Marijuana is BAD For You

Marijuana is an abused, illegal drug in the United States.
Marijuana is a green, brown, or gray mixture of dried, shredded leaves, stems, seeds, and flowers of the hemp plant Cannabis sativa. Cannabis is a term that refers to marijuana and other drugs made from the same plant. Other forms of cannabis include sinsemilla, hashish, and hash oil. All forms of cannabis are mind-altering (psychoactive) drugs.
The main active chemical in marijuana is delta-9-tetrahydrocannabinol, THC for short.
Marijuana is usually smoked as a cigarette (called a joint), or in a pipe or bong. Marijuana smoke has a pungent and distinctive, usually sweet-and-sour odor.
Marijuana has also appeared in blunts, which are cigars that have been emptied of tobacco and refilled with marijuana, sometimes in combination with another drug, such as crack.
Marijuana can also be mixed into foods or used to brew a tea.

Possible Health Effects of Marijuana Use Include:

Problems in daily life or make existing problems worse
Problems with memory and learning
- Can last for days or weeks after the acute effects of the drug wear off... someone who smokes marijuana every day may be functioning at a suboptimal intellectual level all of the time.
Distorted perception
Difficulty in thinking and problem solving
Loss of coordination
Increased heart rate
- Increases heart rate by 20 to 100 percent shortly after smoking and can last up to 3 hours.
- Increased risk of heart attack in the first hour after smoking the drug. This may be due to the increased heart rate as well as effects of marijuana on heart rhythms, causing palpitations and arrhythmias. This risk may be greater in aging populations or those with cardiac vulnerabilities.
Anxiety
Respiratory illnesses
- Daily cough and phlegm production
- More frequent acute chest illnesses
- A heightened risk of lung infections
- A greater tendency toward obstructed airways
- Cancer of the respiratory tract and lungs - Marijuana has the potential to promote cancer of the lungs and other parts of the respiratory tract because marijuana smoke contains 50 percent to 70 percent more carcinogenic hydrocarbons than does tobacco smoke.
Depression
Suicidal ideation
Schizophrenia
Addiction

Marijuana Withdrawal Symptoms May Include:

Irritability
Sleeplessness
Decreased appetite
Anxiety
Drug craving

These withdrawal symptoms begin about 1 day following abstinence, peak at 2 to 3 days, and subside within 1 or 2 weeks following drug cessation.

tammy · **Site Rank:** Site Admin

Quote:

Marijuana has the potential to promote cancer of the lungs and other parts of the respiratory tract because marijuana smoke contains 50 percent to 70 percent more carcinogenic hydrocarbons than does tobacco smoke.

Interesting. I thought marijuana was sometimes used to help treat cancer?

joebert · **Site Rank:** Moderator

Quote:

I thought marijuana was sometimes used to help treat cancer?

Technically, marijuana isn't used to "treat" anything. People who are prescribed pot are people who have a terminal illness.

Quote:

Terminal illness is a medical term popularized in the 20th century to describe an active and malignant disease that cannot be cured or adequately treated and that is reasonably expected to result in the death of the patient.

Marijuana prescriptions have more to do with compassion than medicine.

tammy · **Site Rank:** Site Admin

Guess I thought wrong!

Y's Guy · **Site Rank:** Moderator

Actually, I have a friend who is prescribed marijuana for her glaucoma. It reduces the pressure in her eyes causing less pain and degradation of the eyes. They have made it legal for her to have marijuana in her house... however she can't smoke in the place where she lives due to her Condo home-owners restriction... kind of ironic... I wonder if this might fall under the same a.d.a. laws of allowing you to have a seeing-eye dog go places with you where pets aren't allowed?!?

joebert · **Site Rank:** Moderator

http://www.glaucoma.org/treating/medical_marijua.php

Quote:

Advocates of medicinal marijuana cite evidence that hemp products can lower intraocular pressure (IOP) in people with glaucoma. However, these products are less effective than safer and more available medicines. Most research regarding marijuana use took place before some current medications with fewer side effects were available.

...

The number of significant side effects generated by long-term oral use of marijuana or long-term inhalation of marijuana smoke make marijuana a poor choice in the treatment of glaucoma, a chronic disease requiring proven and effective treatment.

...

I guess I should revise my reply to "Marijuana is reasonably prescribed to people with a terminal illness".

Quote:

I wonder if this might fall under the same a.d.a. laws of allowing you to have a seeing-eye dog go places with you where pets aren't allowed?!?

There's a difference between a trained seeing eye dog, and a toxic substance.

Y's Guy · **Site Rank:** Moderator

I agree... I was just playing Devil's Advocate... I think cigarettes should be banned too. All smoking products should be illegal, but too many people smoke so the government regulates it... Where you can smoke... who you can target... I think the government should do the same with marijuana... too many people do it to keep it illegal for much longer... if the government steps in... that would at least ensure a safer product... less violence over distribution and another income source to help paying off some of our national debt :idea2:

Laughing Gravy · **Site Rank:** Moderator

I disagree that smoking should be banned altogether. People have the right to choose, surely? Regulations on WHERE you can smoke, so that secondhand smoke isn't affecting others is arguably no bad thing, but making it illegal altogether? No.

Would you also advocate a ban on Alcohol, processed sugar, foods that are high-fat, etc? All these things have detrimental effects on health.

How about the internal combustion engine? The fumes aren't too hot in terms of human health either.

You have to draw the line somewhere.

What's next? Compulsory exercise?

I believe in the philosophy that a person should be able to do whatever they want to do, provided they don't affect others negatively whilst doing it. Educate people on the dangers of smoking, drugs, alcohol, poor diet and all the rest of it, but allow them to make the choice. It's their life, their health and their body, and as such it's their choice what they want to do with it, surely?

Ziggy · **Site Rank:** Healthy BBF

Laughing Gravy wrote:

What's next? Compulsory exercise?

Communism!?!?

joebert · **Site Rank:** Moderator

Quote:

I believe in the philosophy that a person should be able to do whatever they want to do, provided they don't affect others negatively whilst doing it. Educate people on the dangers of smoking, drugs, alcohol, poor diet and all the rest of it, but allow them to make the choice. It's their life, their health and their body, and as such it's their choice what they want to do with it, surely?

Only if I get to douse smokers with a bucket of water any time their smoke bothers me. :cap-smile:

Y's Guy · **Site Rank:** Moderator

Smoking Causes Death... what other "legal" substance can claim these types of statistics?

Smoking causes approximately:
90% of all lung cancer deaths in men
80% of all lung cancer deaths in women
90% of deaths from chronic obstructive lung disease

Smoking and Increased Health Risks

Compared with nonsmokers smoking increases the risk of:

Coronary heart disease by 2 to 4 times
Stroke by 2 to 4 times
Men developing lung cancer by 23 times
Women developing lung cancer by 13 times
Dying from chronic obstructive lung diseases by 12 to 13 times

Y's Guy · **Site Rank:** Moderator

If you ban refined sugar... people can over eat still and not exercise and gain weight...

If you ban cigarettes... people won't get lung disease through other avenues in nearly the same percentages!

In a Utopian society... the greatest good would state that yes a ban of cigarettes far outweighs the benefits of having it around.

But I might be a little bias. My grandfather died of a heart attack... aunt had a stroke... and father had a heart attack... the doctors all said smoking was a major driving factor.

But I am a realist and I know too many people do it for a ban to be successful (i.e. prohibition). Maybe we could just get the cigarette companies to not target the younger generation so they won't grow up addicted. I have seen what it did to my dad... a great athlete in his day... now not even able to jog down the street without hacking up a lung... I just wish there was a way to reach him... but there's not... I guess the only reason I really want it banned is so my loved ones wouldn't suffer... but I can't control that... It really does affect the loved ones in a negative way when they know they are addicted and are going to kill themselves on something so stupid!

tammy · **Site Rank:** Site Admin

joebert wrote:

Only if I get to douse smokers with a bucket of water any time their smoke bothers me. :cap-smile:

Me too!

I recently dined out at a restaurant that had a smoking section and non smoking section. We requested to be seated in the non smoking section. All was fine and dandy until we realized that we must have been on the edge of the non smoking section and smoking section because the table right next to us started lighting up cigarettes and then I couldn't breathe during the rest of my dinner! Boy would I have loved to have been able to douse those smokers with a bucket of water. I can't stand smoke and have to hold my breathe anytime I smell it.

Ziggy · **Site Rank:** Healthy BBF

tammy wrote:

joebert wrote:

Only if I get to douse smokers with a bucket of water any time their smoke bothers me. :cap-smile:

Me too!

I recently dined out at a restaurant that had a smoking section and non smoking section. We requested to be seated in the non smoking section. All was fine and dandy until we realized that we must have been on the edge of the non smoking section and smoking section because the table right next to us started lighting up cigarettes and then I couldn't breathe during the rest of my dinner! Boy would I have loved to have been able to douse those smokers with a bucket of water. I can't stand smoke and have to hold my breathe anytime I smell it.

I thought all restaurants were NON Smoking now in the USA.... NO???? What restaurant was that you went to? You should have asked to be moved, or told the management you couldn't breath and your dinner was absolutely ruined... maybe they would have given you your dinner for FREE!!!!

tammy · **Site Rank:** Site Admin

Well, it was in Arizona when I went to visit last month. I don't know what their restaurant smoking rules are. But I guess I forgot to mention that it was a restaurant in a casino. Not sure if that makes a difference or not if there are non smoking rules in Arizona restaurants.

Who is online