Casual Marijuana Smoking not Harmful to Lungs

The waging war against the legalization of marijuana might have been running for several decades already, pointing out the damaging effects brought forth by smoking weed to the lungs. However, a recent study which has been conducted made a claim stating that casual marijuana smoking actually offers no harm to the lungs.

The study was conducted by The University of California in San Francisco and The University of Alabama in Birmingham. It included more than 5000 men and women in four American cities namely Chicago, Birmingham, Oakland and Minneapolis.

According to one of the co-authors of the study, people who casually smoke marijuana were observed to not have any degradation of their lung’s functions. It is even reported that smoking cigarettes is way more harmful as compared to smoking a single joint of marijuana a day. Moreover, even smoking a single joint once a week for 20 years doesn’t seem to show any signs of lung damage as well.

Past findings

The findings in the said study stated that while marijuana does have some of the toxic chemicals that tobacco has, it doesn’t provide the same risks of lung disease nonetheless. Although it isn’t clear why, it is assumed that the main active ingredient of marijuana, which is a chemical known as THC, is the one which makes the huge difference. It is the ingredient which provides the “high” feeling to its users, and it can even ward off inflammation and could counteract the other irritating chemicals in the drug. The study has also found out that marijuana smokers tend to breathe in more deeply when inhaling a single joint, unlike that of cigarette smokers, and some researchers believe that such activity could help strengthen the tissues in the lung instead.

On average, those who smoke cigarettes consumed about 9 sticks daily, while an average marijuana smoker would only smoke a joint or two a week. The researchers who conducted the study also separately calculated the effects of marijuana and tobacco to those people who use one of them, and to people who used both. The results showed that marijuana didn’t provide any harm to the lung function, while cigarette did. As a matter of fact, the test scores of those who smoked cigarettes have worsened throughout the study, while those who smoked marijuana for one joint a day throughout the span of 7 years weren’t even linked with bad scores.

However, marijuana smokers are also expected to develop coughs and irritations, but they didn’t focus on that too much. They also didn’t take a look at lung cancer, but some studies haven’t found out any connection between the use of marijuana and cancer.

It is not yet known for sure why tobacco is more harmful as compared to marijuana, especially that the contents are quite similar. But perhaps it is because of the THC compound which is found in marijuana smoke which has an anti-inflammatory property which helps in soothing the lungs. Other than that, one possible factor could be the way pot smokers smoke, often taking deep breaths as compared to the quick, shallow breathes that cigarette smokers have.

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