Look What My Sister Sent Me..

My sister sent me this in an e-mail:

One study has indicated that a user’s risk of heart attack more than quadruples in the first hour after smoking marijuana. The researchers suggest that such an effect might occur from marijuana’s effects on blood pressure and heart rate and reduced oxygen-carrying capacity of blood.


[You already have a high risk for a heart attack. Heart disease runs in the family. This only makes your having a heart problem all the more likely.]

Someone who smokes marijuana regularly may have many of the same respiratory problems that tobacco smokers do, such as daily cough and phlegm production, more frequent acute chest illness, a heightened risk of lung infections, and a greater tendency to obstructed airways. Smoking marijuana increases the likelihood of developing cancer of the head or neck, and the more marijuana smoked the greater the increase. A study comparing 173 cancer patients and 176 healthy individuals produced strong evidence that marijuana smoking doubled or tripled the risk of these cancers.


[We also have cancer running in the family. It’s obviously on both mom and dad’s side. And I know what you are thinking: ‘Oh, she’s looking at a biased site.’ But no, I’m not. I think you are. You’re looking at sites that promote it. And the pot is really bothering me, too. I smell it in my room with the door shut and everything. It either wafts through the house or comes through the vent. Either way, it gets here. So you’re putting me at risk. And you are one of those regular marijuana smokers. So this pertains to you.]

Marijuana use also has the potential to promote cancer of the lungs and other parts of the respiratory tract because it contains irritants and carcinogens. In fact, marijuana smoke contains 50 to 70 percent more carcinogenic hydrocarbons than does tobacco smoke. It also produces high levels of an enzyme that converts certain hydrocarbons into their carcinogenic form—levels that may accelerate the changes that ultimately produce malignant cells. Marijuana users usually inhale more deeply and hold their breath longer than tobacco smokers do, which increases the lungs’ exposure to carcinogenic smoke. These facts suggest that, puff for puff, smoking marijuana may increase the risk of cancer more than smoking tobacco.


ealth effects may occur because THC impairs the immune system’s ability to fight off infectious diseases and cancer. In laboratory experiments that exposed animal and human cells to THC or other marijuana ingredients, the normal disease-preventing reactions of many of the key types of immune cells were inhibited. In other studies, mice exposed to THC or related substances were more likely than unexposed mice to develop bacterial infections and tumors.

Research has shown that marijuana’s adverse impact on memory and learning can last for days or weeks after the acute effects of the drug wear off.

[Yeah, you said it just lasts while you’re high. You were wrong.]

Long-term marijuana use can lead to addiction for some people; that is, they use the drug compulsively even though it interferes with family, school, work, and recreational activities. Drug craving and withdrawal symptoms can make it hard for long-term marijuana smokers to stop using the drug. People trying to quit report irritability, sleeplessness, and anxiety. They also display increased aggression on psychological tests, peaking approximately one week after the last use of the drug.

[Oh really? I was told you couldn’t get addicted to marijuana. Apparently, they even have a Marijuana Anonymous. Don’t get mad at me for this information. I’m only trying to help you. You’ll thank me later if you ever get your head on straight.]





They green text is what she thinks..


I don't know how to respond to this..except give her other sites back?


I want her to realize that it's not a bad thing to do.. she thinks that it's bad because she is younger (14) and that's the message relayed to them at that age..

 

well, shes pretty stupid for relying on a single source
but youd be pretty stupid if you didnt already know all this info (i hope you did!)

though some is rather stupid.

lung cancer is not genetic like heart problems are

why do you smoke in the house? if you dont, and its jsut the smell, then she is in no danger of secondary smoke, the amount would be negligably small.

if the chance of a teenager getting a heart attack is quadripled its like going from 1 in 10000000 to 1 in 2500000 its still bloody small. less than that even. hell add a zero to the end of those.

but i hope you were jsut telling her the effects of weed are only when your high to shut her up, and dont actually beleive it yourself...

with the lung cancer thing tell her that youve got less chance of lung cancer than people who smoke cigarettes, and then demonstrate to her how many poeple do cigarettes and still dont get lung cancer.


finally, find some way to have her jsut smoke a bit so that she understands why you do it. tell her you wont respect her oppinion until she tries it.

 

just do it when shes not around, or do it somewhere else. end of problem.
dont worry about sending back anything, because a lot of it is true. im really positive its not a healthy thing to do. but anyways, just tell her you respect your opinion and leave it at that. her time will come when she'll understand.

but anyways, how much of that is true? like some things i was wondering about.

"reduced oxygen-carrying capacity of blood.?"
"marijuana smoke contains 50 to 70 percent more carcinogenic hydrocarbons than does tobacco smoke.?"

but yea, ive been checking my pulse sometimes to see how fast its beating, and its always normal. but that really does depend on the person.

 

My parents let me smoke, but haven't really talked to my sister about it yet. So she thinks it's this evil drug that they let me do. And also, I'm on the opposite side of the house from her. I always smoke with my doors closed.. and I usually light some incense. She might be able to get a whiff of it in the air, but it's not secondhand smoke or anything..

Yeah I was. I can tell that I don't have very good short term memory, even when I'm not stoned. But I don't mind it...

 

LOL tell your sister only a 90 year old with previous heart problems who smokes marijuana has that high of a risk of dying of a heart attack. A young, healthy male has nothing to worry about.

 

The tests that were conducted to find the relative amounts of carcinogens in marijuana and tobacco are bull. You know the ones that say "one joint contains 4 times as many carcinogens as one cigarette"? That joint was made out of marijuana leaves, not buds. Marijuana buds have something like 30 percent less carcinogens than tobacco.

 

pick your own poison

 

You can overdose and die on Caffeine.

 

She is wrong on the cancer part. THC has actually been shown to reduce cancerous tumors. Thus said by a study done in i believe either spain or purtugal. If i remember correctly, several rats were "given" cancerous tumors and a selection was given a shot each day of thc. several of the rats that were subjected to the thc treatment reported a decrease in the size of the tumors, and in a couple, the tumor was completely irradicated. However, this is on of the effects of thc, not cannabis smoke. But several studies have shown that cannabis smoke is not carcinogenic. I say send her a link to Jack Herer's The emperor wears no clothes and tell her to read it. Then ask her to send you information of all those people that have gotten cancer from smokin weed. It would also be nice to send her a list of how many people have died directly from the use of cannabis : a big Fat Zer0.

Or i dont know, just bitch at her.

 

Although I do agree that a long term user can get a large amount of aggression and sleeplessness when the person stops regular use. I know this from expeirience. I havent had pot for 2 days and I dont really feel like I wanna respond to this message like I am, i feel like calling your sister names, but I wont. As to the part with the second hand smoke, invest in a Vaporizer, then she doesent have to worry about cancer getting to you or to her threw second hand smoke.

 

sorry about how fragmented and discolo(u)red everything is...

 

dude do you want to edit that so we can read it properly?

 

Yeah, but it's hard for someone to convince me not to smoke because in terms of respiratory damage a user is at high risk. I already knew that. People seem to think that this is some sort of new knowledge. The truth really is that Marijuana hasn't had nearly enough study done on it to come to much real, conclusive findings. The N.I.D.A here in America does a lot of study, but when they pass this information on to the Department of Health and Human Services, and when they subsequently pass that information on to the head of the Drug Enforcement Agency, the D.E.A. just chooses to ignore it.

Marijuana has been a schedule 1 narcotic since the Controlled Substances Act was passed in Congress in 1970. The act says that a schedule 1 narcotic is illegal because it has no pharmacological/medicinal use and has a great potential for abuse and addiction.

The only problem is that A: Marijuana can be used as a medicine for several purposes, and B: none of the receptors of T.H.C. are found in the ventral tegmental area - the essential area in the reward system of the brain which, found in rats, is the system which is responsible for compulsive drug injection... I.E. addiction. Basically this means that as far as modern science can find, Marijuana has no possibility of physicall addiction. I really don't see how it can justifiably still be considered a schedule 1 narcotic. Cocaine is accepted as a medicine and is given a schedule 2 classification for Christ's sake! Even when findings are found by scientists outside of the United States, the National Institute for Drug Abuse either doesn't care about them, or the D.E.A. discards the information. I think it's safe to say that if the war against Marijuana prohibition is going to be won, it's certainly not going to be won until we have some reasonable people in power (I.E. not in a long, long time... if ever).

The fact that Marijuana is bad for your lungs is just that, though, a fact. If you inhale any type of smoke, carcinogenic or not, you're going to damage your respiratory system. This is why it's best to use a vaporizer, drink Marijuana, or eat it. Eating and drinking Marijuana greatly changes your high, though. It's basically one of those things that you just measure on your scales; be able to be high and have torn up lungs, or live with sobriety and be able to breath without any restriction.

 

thank you stevo. arnt you awesome.
and yes, caffeine=bad. i o/d on it once...it was the worst day of my entire life.

i think if america put as much money into finding out the truth about mj as it did in making it look bad and teaching the horribleness of it to all the kids, we'd already be walkin around smokin joints whenever, wherever.

we have ignorant assholes running our country and departments, thats our problem.

 

Point her to an unbiased site such as http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cannabis

Inhaling any kind of smoke into your lungs is unnatural, which is why I prefer to eat it!

 

send her the "burn one down" song lyrics by ben harper

 

This is right. Much as we like to believe pot is good for us, the smoke is not. Inhaling smoke is never going to be good for the body, that's a fact. There are carcinogens (though no more, and probably LESS than in cigs) in all smoke. Marijuana smoke has been shown to do less damage than cigs, it causes fewer lesions in the lungs, but it's still not great for you.

This is a lie, studies are showing that THC and other cannabinoids actually improve the immune system and can help fight/shrink tumors.

Also a lie, unless you use weed all the time, every day all day, there is little or no effect on memory and learning; and in moderate use, may even improve it in some areas.

I think you should look around for some unbiased sites to follow up on this stuff. But you should also respect your sister and try not to shove it in her face. Don't let the smell go through the house and stuff, go outside to smoke, or something.

 

*Sigh* Another victim of the D.A.R.E Generation....

She says the reason that you don't see that is because you look at biased sites, but the studies the gov't and the DEA uses for their case against weed are incredibly biased... back inthe 70s? (correct me if im wrong, i don't remember exactly how it went down) the scientist that was conducting studies on Monkeys concluded you can OD on pot and you lose brain cells, but he also gave them more smoke then anyone can naturally inhale or take in, and he cut oxygen off to them...

Ask her for the sources of that bullshit, what university did that study? Who did the studies? The government and the DEA has more of an agenda to keep Marijuana illegal then the people trying to make it legal, the gov't also has more power...

Tell her to wake the fuck up and stop believing everything she reads on the internet. If she continues to believe everything that she's read about it, send her to a chatroom where other "14 year old boys" want to meet up with her, because I'm sure they are just as truthful as these studies

 

Yeah, the scientist was lazy (or wanted to fuck the results) and instead of spacing out the testing (making the monkeys smoke marijuana), he put oxygen masks on them and pumped the equivalent of 63 joints into each monkey's lungs in the space of 5 minutes. Then, surprise surprise, when he disected their brains, he found all kinds of dead cells! Couldn't have anything to do with lack of oxygen and excessive amounts of carbon monoxide, though, right? This study is the basis of "weed kills brain cells." Internationally, this study was laughed at for the joke that it is, yet it was often cited (still sometimes is) as evidence here in the states.

 

thats so sweet, she's looking out for her older sibling.. my answer, be a fucking role model and A stop smoking it or B dont smoke around her area... atleast she isnt ragging and telling the cops or w/e