Photographer: Andrew Burton / Getty Images
Photographer: Andrew Burton / Getty Images
According to a new study, smoking cannabis may pose a greater risk for teens to develop symptoms of lung injury than those who smoke cigarettes or marijuana or who vaporize nicotine.
Adolescents were about twice as likely to report wheezing or whistling in the chest as those who made e-cigarettes or smoked, demonstrated the results of the University of Michigan. The researchers also assessed whether participants reported a dry cough at night that was unrelated to a temporary infection or if it appeared to be wheezing during exercise.
The findings challenge the conventional wisdom that smoking cigarettes or smoking nicotine is the most harmful to the lungs, said Carol Boyd, principal investigator and professor at the university’s School of Nursing.
“Certainly, cigarettes and e-cigarettes are not healthy and are not good for the lungs,” Boyd said in a statement on the university’s website. “However, smoking marijuana seems even worse.”
The researchers did not find that the use of electronic cigarettes or cigarettes led to more respiratory symptoms in the adolescents who participated in the study. They did not specify where the cannabis products were purchased or whether they were legal.
Vaporizing devices have become increasingly a popular way to consume cannabis, including in the form of wax or oil. A wave of mysterious lung diseases and vaping-related deaths toppled the industry before the coronavirus pandemic. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention finally found one binding with vitamin E acetate, which has been used as a cutting agent in e-liquids which contains THC, the main active ingredient in marijuana, often in illicit products.
Read more: Even Nobel Prize-winning chemists don’t know what’s in your grass Vape
The University of Michigan study included thousands of teens ages 12 to 17 who reported symptoms themselves Study on tobacco health and the population. One of the limitations of the report is that it did not contemplate the co-use of smoking cannabis and cigarettes or e-cigarettes, the researchers said.
Michael R. Bloomberg, founder and majority owner of Bloomberg LP, mother of Bloomberg News, has campaigned and donated money in support of the U.S. ban on e-cigarettes and flavored tobacco.
(Updates with details on the cannabis products in the fifth paragraph.)