Quote Originally Posted by Markass
You know what, you're absolutely right. But something you're overlooking is that unfortunately, there's not evidence to point the cause of lung cancer in any instance to marijuana. It simply cannot happen, and has been proven in Dr. Tashakin's study..."The heaviest smokers in the study had smoked more than 22,000 marijuana cigarettes, or joints, while moderately heavy smokers had smoked between 11,000 to 22,000 joints. Even these smokers did not have an increased risk of developing cancer. People who smoked more marijuana were not at any increased risk compared with those who smoked less marijuana or none at all." And if you're referring to me as a non-scientifically inclined kid, you're entitled to your opinion. However, anything that I say/post about marijuana anywhere is based on a scientific study/scientific research. Bottom line, I know way too many people that are in just as good if not better health as normal people...yet they have smoked marijuana the entirity of their lives. And something you said about nasty laced schwagg weed might give someone cancer, or inadequately flushed hydro might...that's not marijuana causing cancer in any way...it's environmental factors..whatever's in the mexican weed, and the chemicals in the hydro cause the cancers if any, not any chemical that's naturally in cannabis. Once again, the ABSOLUTE is that I know ten to fifteen people who have smoked since their young years and are absolutely fine.
I think you must be very scientifically naive. Or very young. Or both. You keep putting absolute faith in the Tashkin study, which was a statistically very small sampling (2,052 people). Compared to the population in question, even the larger Kaiser study was comparatively insignificant in comparison to the studies and tracking that have been done with tobacco. Tashkin himself in his reports uses the term "does not appear to increase. . . " because he's intelligent enough to know that while those findings are very hopeful, they're not yet a sweeping, it's-perfectly-safe endorsement. You'll notice, too, that Tashkin and his researchers are only just beginning to look into the DNA changes cannabis smoking seems to set inot motion. And there are still at least two credible studies that have established a positive link between cannabis and increased lung cancer risk. Whether it's directly from cannabis chemicals themselves or one of the accompanying environmental factors like pesticides or hydroponic solutions, cancer is cancer. And I will forever maintain that there's still plenty of chance that, in certain people, it can increase cancer risk.

Here's the other thing. I've lived a good bit longer than most of you guys. So I've known folks who've smoked weed a lot longer. One of my oldest friend's best chums died last year from lung cancer that had spread all over. He was 49. He'd been a heavy pot smoker since his teenage years. Never cigarettes. Only weed. And yes, he died of lung cancer. (A different kind of lung cancer, by the way, from the one that's seen most often in cigarette smokers.) I also have a former colleague, a guy I've known for nearly 30 years, who's just been moved into a hospice facility in my hometown. He was never a cigarette smoker. Hated cigarettes, in fact, and felt no one should smoke anything else but pot. He was a very heavy, heavy cannabis smoker. Lost several jobs because of it and was one of my hometown's most notorious potheads and supplier of a large percentage of the university population in my college days. He's 57 and is now within three months of dying of large cell lung cancer.

So keep thinking the absolutes are absolutely true. I know they're not. Ask cardiopulmonary physicians like my husband and his colleagues about the cancers they see, and they'll tell you, too, that they see instances as well in people who are/were heavy cannabis smokers. They're not nearly as frequent as what they see in cigarette smokers, but in some people, whether it's from DNA changes or other environmental factors or just surprisingly bad health luck, lung cancer can occur. Until in-depth, large-scale studies over periods of decades are conducted, which isn't likely to happen in this country anytime soon, "does not appear to increase. . . " doesn't yet mean "absolutely does not increase."