Smokers cough (not cigs)

[Terps]

how many of u get a smokers cough from pot??

latly i have had a cold (going on like 3 weeks, so should be ending soon) and lalty i think i have had a bad case of a smokers cough to cause i cough up flem and just cough for like 15 mins straight in the mornings and maybe 3 other times a day...idk maybe im just sick.

You?

Terps Reviewed by Terps on 12-12-2006. Smokers cough (not cigs) how many of u get a smokers cough from pot?? latly i have had a cold (going on like 3 weeks, so should be ending soon) and lalty i think i have had a bad case of a smokers cough to cause i cough up flem and just cough for like 15 mins straight in the mornings and maybe 3 other times a day...idk maybe im just sick. You? Rating: 5

[bucknuts1870]

Couple times a year maybe I'll go through a stretch where I can't really smoke like I usually do(take huge bong rips without hacking up a lung). I also will cough up black phlegm, then it goes away for a few months or so.

[yoda]

Couple times a year maybe I'll go through a stretch where I can't really smoke like I usually do(take huge bong rips without hacking up a lung). I also will cough up black phlegm, then it goes away for a few months or so.

i go through this too, but way more often now that ive been smoking cigs the last 2 yrs

[LIP]

If the phlem is like a yellowy greeny colour it's almost def a chest infection, i get them maybe 2 a year, weed helps me with em, never gives me em.

[yoda]

If the phlem is like a yellowy greeny colour it's almost def a chest infection, i get them maybe 2 a year, weed helps me with em, never gives me em.

gosh that description is so gross sounding, but mine are usually a yellowish color. im more disturbed when its brown though. when my throat really hurts, like i cant even inhale, thats when the brown comes to town. i dont even take meds or anything though, but ill be fine in a week.

[LIP]

Yahhh, i hate it. It's all the shit being coughed up from your lungs... horrible stuff, but if i smoke my weed it gets rid of it in like a week or 2.

[sickstrings420]

Do You smoke a lot of blunts. I smoke blunts every time I smoke, and I smoke everyday. And I've noticed that about once every couple of months, I have to stop smoking blunts for a couple ofdays to let my throat clear up. But I can still smoke pipes and j's, just not blunts.

[Captain Hanks]

Lung Damage Studies

The Hype:

More Harmful Than Tobacco

According to the American Lung Association, cigarettes and tobacco smoking related diseases kill more than 430,000 Americans every year. Fifty million Americans smoke, and 3,000 teens start each day. The Berkeley carcinogenic tar studies of the late 1970s concluded that "marijuana is one-and-a-half times more carcinogenic than tobacco."

The Fact:

Not One Documented Case of Cancer

There are lung irritants involved in any smoke. Cannabis smoke causes mild irritation to the large airways of the lungs. Symptoms disappear when smoking is discontinued.

However, unlike tobacco smoke, cannabis smoke does not cause any changes in the small airways, the area where tobacco smoke causes long term and permanent damage. Additionally, a tobacco smoker will smoke 20 to 60 cigarettes a day, while a heavy marijuana smoker may smoke five to seven joints a day, even less when potent high-quality flower tops are available.

While tens of millions of Americans smoke pot regularly, cannabis has never caused a known case of lung cancer as of December 1997, according to America's foremost lung expert, Dr. Donald Tashkin of UCLA. He considers the biggest health risk to the lungs would be a person smoking 16 or more "large" spliffs a day of leaf/bud because of the hypoxia of too much smoke and not enough oxygen.

Tashkin feels there is no danger for anyone to worry about potentiating emphysema "in any way" by the use of marijuana totally the opposite of tobacco.

Cannabis is a complex, highly evolved plant. There are some 400 compounds in its smoke. Of these, 60 are presently known to have therapeutic value.

Cannabis may also be eaten, entirely avoiding the irritating effects of smoke. However, four times more of the active ingredients of smoked cannabis are absorbed by the human body than when the same amount is eaten. And the prohibition inflated price of black market cannabis, combined with harsh penalties for cultivation, prevent most persons from being able to afford the luxury of a less efficient, though healthier, means of ingestion.

Lab Studies Fail to Reflect the Real World

Studies have proven that many of the carcinogens in cannabis can be removed by using a water pipe system. Our government omitted this information and its significance when speaking to the press. At the same time politicians outlawed the sale of water pipes, labeling them "drug paraphernalia."

How Rumors Get Started

In 1976, Dr. Tashkin, M.D., UCLA, sent a written report to Dr. Gabriel Nahas at the Rheims, France, Conference on "Potential Cannabis Medical Dangers." That report became the most sensationalized story to come out of this negative world conference on cannabis.

This surprised Tashkin, who had sent the report to the Rheims conference as an afterthought.

What Tashkin reported to the Rheims conference was that only one of the 29 pulmonary areas of the human lung studied the large air passageway Did he find marijuana to be more of an irritant (by 15 times) than tobacco. This figure is insignificant, however, since Tashkin also notes that tobacco has almost no effect on this area. Therefore, 15 times almost nothing is still almost nothing. in any event, cannabis has a positive or neutral effect in most other areas of the lung. (See Chapter 7, "Therapeutic Uses of Cannabis.")

(Tashkin, Dr. Donald, UCLA studies, 1969-83; UCLA Pulmonary Studies, 1969-95.)

Afterwards in 1977, the U.S. government resumed funding for ongoing cannabis pulmonary studies which it had cut two years earlier when Tashkin reported encouraging therapeutic results with marijuana/lung studies. But now the government limited funding only to research to the large air passageway.

We have interviewed Dr. Tashkin dozens of times. In 1986 I asked him about an article he was preparing for the New England Journal of Medicine, indicating that cannabis smoke caused as many or more pre-cancerous lesions as tobacco in "equal" amounts.

Most people do not realize, nor are the media told, that any tissue abnormality (abrasion, eruption, or even redness) is called a pre-cancerous lesion. Unlike lesions caused by tobacco, the THC-related lesions contain no radioactivity.

We asked Tashkin how many persons had gone on to get lung cancer in these or any other studies of long-term cannabis-only smokers (Rastas, Coptics, etc.)

Sitting in his UCLA laboratory, Dr. Tashkin looked at me and said, "That's the strange part. So far no one we've studied has gone on to get lung cancer."

"Was this reported to the press?"

"Well, it's in the article," Dr. Tashkin said. "But no one in the press even asked. They just assumed the worst." His answer to us was still that not one single case of lung cancer in someone who only smoked cannabis, has ever been reported. It should be remembered that he and other doctors had predicted 20 years ago, their certainty that hundreds of thousands of marijuana smokers would by now (1997) have developed lung cancer.

Another Fact:

Emphysema Suffers Benefit

During a later interview, Tashkin congratulated me on the tip I'd given him that marijuana used for emphysema produced good results among persons we knew.

He laughed at me originally, because he had presumed that marijuana aggravated emphysema, but after reviewing his evidence found that, except in the rarest of cases, marijuana was actually of great benefit to emphysema suffers due to the opening and dilation of the bronchial passages.

And so the relief reported to us by cannabis smoking emphysema patients was confirmed.

Marijuana smoke is not unique in its benefits to the lungs. Yerba Santa, Colt's foot, Horehound, and other herbs have traditionally been smoked to help the lungs.

Tobacco and its associated dangers have so prejudiced persons against "smoking" that most persons believe cannabis smoking to be as or more dangerous than tobacco. With research banned, these public health and safety facts are not readily available.

In December 1997, we asked Dr. Tashkin again, and he unequivocably stated that "marijuana does not cause or potentiate emphysema in any way." In addition, there has not been one case of lung cancer ever attributed to smoking cannabis.

. . . And So On

Most of the anti-marijuana literature we have examined does not cite as much as one single source for us to review. Others only refer to DEA or NIDA. The few studies we have been able to track down usually end up being anecdotal case histories, artificial groupings of data, or otherwise lacking controls and never replicated.

Reports of breast enlargement, obesity, addiction, and the like all remain unsubstantiated, and are given little credence by the scientific community. Other reports, like the temporary reduction in sperm count, are statistically insignificant to the general public, yet get blown far out of proportion when presented by the media. Still others, like the handful of throat tumors in the Sacramento area and the high rate of injuries reported in a Baltimore trauma unit are isolated clusters that run contrary to all other statistics and have never been replicated.

The spurious results of Heath, Nahas, and the pregnant mice and monkey studies at Temple University and UC Davis (where they injected mice with synthetic third-cousin analogues of THC) are now discredited in the body of scientific and medical literature.

Though these studies are not used in scientific discourse, mountains of DEA and pharmaceutical company-sponsored literature about the long-term possible effects of these metabolites on the brain and reproduction still goes to parent groups as if they were brand new studies. This disinformation is still very much alive in U.S. government, DEA, DARE, and PDFA reports.

(Read the 1982 N.I.H.; the National Academy of Science's evaluation on past studies; and the Costa Rica report, 1980.) No Harm to Human Brain or Intelligence Hemp has been used in virtually all societies since time immemorial as a work motivator and to highlight and renew creative energies.

ASTHMA

More than 15 million Americans are affected by asthma. Smoking cannabis (the "raw drug" as the AMA called it) would be beneficial for 80% of them and add 30-a60 million person-years in the aggregate of extended life to current asthmatics over presently legal toxic medicines such as the Theophylline prescribed to children. "Taking a hit of marijuana has been known to stop a full blown asthma attack." (Personal communication with Dr. Donald Tashkin, December 12, 1989 and December 1, 1997.) The use of cannabis for asthmatics goes back thousands of years in literature. American doctors of the last century wrote glowing reports in medical papers that asthma sufferers of the world would "bless" Indian hemp (cannabis) all their lives. Today, of the 16 million American asthma sufferers, only Californians, with a doctor's recommendation, can legally grow and use cannabis medicines, even though it is generally the most effective treatment for asthma.

(Tashkin, Dr. Donald, UCLA Pulmonary Studies (for smoked marijuana), 1969-97; Ibid., asthma studies, 1969-76; Cohen, Sidney & Stillman, Therapeutic Potential of Marijuana, 1976; Life Insurance Actuarial rates; Life shortening effects of childhood asthma, 1983.)

LUNG CLEANER AND EXPECTORANT

Cannabis is the best natural expectorant to clear the human lungs of smog, dust and the phlegm associated with tobacco use. Marijuana smoke effectively dilates the airways of the lungs, the bronchi, opening them to allow more oxygen into the lungs. It is also the best natural dilator of the tiny airways of the lungs, the bronchial tubes - making cannabis the best overall bronchial dilator for 80% of the population (the remaining 20% sometimes show minor negative reactions). (See section on asthma - a disease that closes these passages in spasms - UCLA Tashkin studies, 1969-97; U.S. Costa Rican, 1980-82; Jamaican studies 1969-74, 76.) Statistical evidence - showing up consistently as anomalies in matched populations - indicates that people who smoke tobacco cigarettes are usually better off and will live longer if they smoke cannabis moderately, too. (Jamaicna, Costa Rican studies.) Millions of Americans have given up or avoided smoking tobacco products in favor of cannabis, which is not good news to the powerful tobacco lobby - Senator Jesse Helms and his cohorts. A turn-of-the-century grandfather clause in U.S. tobacco law allows 400 to 6,000 additional chemicals to be added. Additions since then to the average tobacco cigarette are unknown, and the public in the U.S. has no right to know what they are. Many joggers and marathon runners feel cannabis use cleans their lungs, allowing better endurance. The evidence indicates that cannabis use will probably increase these outlaw American marijuana-users' lives by about one to two years - yet they may lose their rights, property, children, state licenses, etc., just for using that safest of substances: cannabis.

THERAPEUTIC EMPHYSEMA POTENTIAL

Medical research indicates that light cannabis smoking might be useful for a majority of mild emphysema victims. It would improve the quality of life for millions of sufferers and extend their life spans. The U.S. government and DEA (since 1976) say the side effect of being "high" is not acceptable, no matter how many years or lives it saves; even though some 90 million Americans have tried marijuana and 25 to 30 million still smoke marijuana relaxationally, or use it responsibly as a form of daily self-medication, without one single death from overdoes - ever! All research into the oxygen blood transfer effects cause by cannabis indicates that the chest (lung) pains, extremity pains, shallowness of breath, and headaches we may experience on heavy smog days are usually alleviated by cannabis smoking throughout the day. Dr. Donald Tashkin, the U.S. government's leading scientist on marijuana pulmonary research, told us in December 1989*, and again in December 1997, that you cannot get or potentiate emphysema with cannabis smoking. * See Tashkin's Marijuana Pulmonary Research, UCLA, 1969-1997. Since 1981, this author has personally taken part in these studies and has continuously interviewed Tashkin on cannabis' medical indications; last personal interview was in December 1997.

Having that given, I really don't know what you guys are talking about. Either your smoking cigs with your herb, or your not being honest. Cannabis only smokers don't cough up black tar. The only time I cough is when I'm sick, in wich I cough up green-yellowish phlegm (as if my lungs were cleaning it out before it reached my nose?)!

[birdgirl73]

Captain, I think you're both irresponsible and annoying. For one thing, you never even attempt to argue using your own words and thoughts. And you're putting a whole lot of stock in that 30-year-old Tashkin study, which is certainly not the only one that's been done. But the most insulting thing, besides the fact that you seem more than anything to simply want to take up vast amounts of thread room with your long, copied blocks of text, is that you're denying the actual first-hand experience of people here. If you'd listen and read what others have said, including me, you'll see that people have indeed reported smokers' coughs, aggravated ashtma and other pulmonary irritation as a result of smoking weed. My husband is a cardio-pulmonary physician, and he's seen countless cases of folks with similar problems, and not only among cigarette smokers. You discount what other studies have revealed and what living, breathing, real-life experienced people, including practicing physicians, have encountered. I think you're doing others a disservice by not accepting that not all experiences are as positive as that study you keep citing.

[Captain Hanks]

Captain, I think you're both irresponsible and annoying. For one thing, you never even attempt to argue using your own words and thoughts. And you're putting a whole lot of stock in that 30-year-old Tashkin study, which is certainly not the only one that's been done. But the most insulting thing, besides the fact that you seem more than anything to simply want to take up vast amounts of thread room with your long, copied blocks of text, is that you're denying the actual first-hand experience of people here. If you'd listen and read what others have said, including me, you'll see that people have indeed reported smokers' coughs, aggravated ashtma and other pulmonary irritation as a result of smoking weed. My husband is a cardio-pulmonary physician, and he's seen countless cases of folks with similar problems, and not only among cigarette smokers. You discount what other studies have revealed and what living, breathing, real-life experienced people, including practicing physicians, have encountered. I think you're doing others a disservice by not accepting that not all experiences are as positive as that study you keep citing.

Even if you are right, (as I also believe cannabis smoking (inhalation of burnt plant matter) does indeed cause irritation to the lungs, but I find it hard to believe that it would go on to such things as pulmonary lung disease, chronic bronchitis, emphysema...etc. Again I am talking about cannabis only smokers. (you guys aren't smoking out of metal/paper are you?)