Two just-published studies assessing adults' risk of cancer have reported wildly divergent, and fairly extraordinary, outcomes. One study you may have read about. The other has been ignored entirely by the mainstream media. But no doubt the results of both will surprise you.
First, the study you may have heard of. Writing August 3 in the journal Cancer Epidemiology, investigators at McGill University in Montreal reported that moderate alcohol consumption -- defined as six drinks or fewer per week -- by adults is positively associated with an elevated risk of various cancers, including stomach cancer, rectal cancer, and bladder cancer.
And now for the study you haven't heard of. Writing in the August issue of the journal Cancer Prevention Research, investigators from Rhode Island's Brown University, along with researchers at Boston University, Louisiana State University, and the University of Minnesota reported that lifetime marijuana use is associated with a "significantly reduced risk" of head and neck squamous cell carcinoma.
Authors reported, "after adjusting for potential confounders (including smoking and alcohol drinking), 10 to 20 years of marijuana use was associated with a significantly reduced risk of head and neck squamous cell carcinoma (HNDCC)."
Perhaps even more notably, subjects who smoked marijuana and consumed alcohol and tobacco (two known high risk factors for head and neck cancers) also experienced a reduced risk of cancer, the study found.
"Our study suggests that moderate marijuana use is associated with reduced risk of HNSCC," investigators concluded. "This association was consistent across different measures of marijuana use (marijuana use status, duration, and frequency of use)....Further, we observed that marijuana use modified the interaction between alcohol and cigarette smoking, resulting in a decreased HNSCC risk among moderate smokers and light drinkers, and attenuated risk among the heaviest smokers and drinkers."
This isn't the first time that U.S. investigators have documented an inverse association between pot use and cancer. A separate 2006 population case-control study, funded by the U.S. National Institutes of Health and conducted by the University of California at Los Angeles, also reported that lifetime use of cannabis was not positively associated with cancers of the lung or aerodigestive tract, and further noted that certain moderate users of the drug experienced a reduced cancer risk compared to non-using controls.
Predictably, the federal government's goal when green-lighting the UCLA study was to conclusively establish just the opposite result, as explained recently by its lead researcher Dr. Donald Tashkin.
In an interview with the McClatchy newspaper chain in June, Dr. Tashkin admitted that he expected his study would find that pot was associated with "increased health effects." Instead, he summarized, "What we found instead was no association (between marijuana smoking and cancer) and even a suggestion of some protective effect."
Tashkin added, "[A]t this point, I'd be in favor of (marijuana) legalization. I wouldn't encourage anybody to smoke any substances. But I don't think it should be stigmatized as an illegal substance. Tobacco smoking causes far more harm. And in terms of an intoxicant, alcohol causes far more harm (than marijuana)."
Despite these findings, which to date inexplicably remain under-reported by the mainstream press, many so-called experts persist with claims that marijuana smoking is causally linked to cancer. In fact, in June the California Environmental Protection Agency with great fanfare added marijuana smoke to its list of chemicals that possess potential carcinogenic properties and/or are associated with reproductive toxicity. You know what other commonly indulged in substance also appears on this list? That would be alcohol. Of course that conclusion, much like the reports of marijuana's anti-cancer prowess, apparently went up in smoke.
Paul Armentano is the Deputy Director of the National Organization for the Reform of Marijuana Laws (NORML) and is the co-author of the new book Marijuana Is Safer: So Why Are We Driving People to Drink? (Chelsea Green Publishing).
This study is just another indicator that we are living in Bizarro World.
We know Cannabis helps cure MRSA (Drug resistant staff infections), skin cancer and acne(when used topically), and actually slows the development of brain degeneration in Alzheimer patients, but nothing is done. Not to mention the cell protective properties that the U.S. government holds a patent on.
A few years ago, they injected Glioma cells (The cancer Kennedy has) with Cannabinoids, and video taped the results. The Cannabinoids coated and protected the viable cells and actually stopped the propagation of the cancer cells and they died off (because they couldn't get nutrients). All on video. We have not heard a word of this in the MSM.
A better question would be, "If Senator Kennedy's life gets saved because of Cannabinoid injections into his brain cancer, would we ever hear about it?"
What we don't know can kill us.
Read the abstract here:http://www.sciencedirect.com/science?_ob=ArticleURL&_udi=B6T0C-4CTTJ19-1&_user=10&_rdoc=1&_fmt=&_orig=search&_sort=d&_docanchor=&view=c&_searchStrId=984872305&_rerunOrigin=google&_acct=C000050221&_version=1&_urlVersion=0&_userid=10&md5=d5229099704fea14c3e81c1b03e24791
Meanwhile, millions of Americans are addicted to highly toxic pharmaceuticals that come with a long list of side effects that can damage your liver and kidneys, but, they are "legal" so it's just fine with everyone. It makes no sense at all.
But actually it's all about not letting the dirty hippies get their way.
Sales of anti-depressants tank.
Stress-related illness becomes a historical oddity.
Menstruation ceases to cause misery.
Oh... there is just not enough room here to list all the benefits.
Forget passing a health reform bill: all the participants have been bought.
Legalize Pot and the point becomes almost moot.
Seeing/Hearing/Feeling/Believing - That is Knowledge, and knowledge is a form of power, and CIGARETTES deplete your BRAIN of oxygen, and stop your brain from operating effectively. I see that our government has criminalized everything that they thought was bad for us. They were on the right track during the PROHIBITION ERA, and then we brought it back on yourselves again. People who are addicted to the chemical in CIGARETTES(Nicotine), not the tobacco leaves themselves, Let's ask the average everyday person who is addicted to cigarette's, if they have ever really seen a tobacco plant in real life.. No I haven't and I'm contemplating, three day's in hell, from withdraw from cigarettes this disgusting vice that I cannot control where and when I need to relief my stress, so I smoke cigarettes to relive stress but there killing me at the same time. Cigarettes need to be ILLEGAL they need to on PROHIBITION, and this plant, this herb which has been here since the dawn of man, it needs knocked off that controlled substance list. Obviously, it's helping cancer patient's who could have cancer from smoking Cigarette's, or drinking Alcohol. Obviously from the research shown above, IT'S HELPING, not HURTING!! WE THE PEOPLE!! WE ARE UNITED!!
http://www.petermcwilliams.org/
Listen, Obama's not going to blow health care reform by standing up for legalization or even a rational dialogue (his Drug Czar may as well have been Reagan's) on marijuana, etc.
and THEN he goes and blows health care anyway.
Change happens by degrees. You may be aware that the Feds have backed off on raids and prosecution. We don't know what is in the works. Decriminalization would suit me just fine.