Marijuana use holds three-fold blood pressure death risk: study • Hacker News Board

Re: Marijuana use holds three-fold blood pressure death risk: study

#61

Post by austinheap » Thu, Aug 10, 2017, 4:48 PM UTC

elif wrote: post #8

nxsynonym wrote: post #4

>> "If marijuana use is implicated in cardiovascular diseases and deaths, then it rests on the health community and policy makers to protect the public." Like how the policy makers protect the public from Alcohol, tobacco, and over-the-counter meds? Also a 1200 person study isn't really enough to draw any major conclusions from. Of course ingesting anything substance of any kind frequently over a period of time is bo…

yea i had a hard time making sense of the paper, probably my fault. it seemed like they didn't control for obesity, and it also seemed like alcohol had a much stronger correlation. I would love to hear from someone that can properly read it though. I also find it interesting that the odds for marijuana users are 1.05 per year but, e.g. marriage is 1.17, alcohol 1.84 etc, yet the conclusion is about marijuana. Bias: I…

The headline could have been...

> Marriage greater risk to heart than cannabis: report

But that wouldn't sell as well.

Re: Marijuana use holds three-fold blood pressure death risk: study

#62

Post by priam » Thu, Aug 10, 2017, 4:48 PM UTC

heroprotagonist wrote: post #40

nxsynonym wrote: post #4

>> "If marijuana use is implicated in cardiovascular diseases and deaths, then it rests on the health community and policy makers to protect the public." Like how the policy makers protect the public from Alcohol, tobacco, and over-the-counter meds? Also a 1200 person study isn't really enough to draw any major conclusions from. Of course ingesting anything substance of any kind frequently over a period of time is bo…

A 1213 participant study, of which 72.5% are assumed still alive. So ~334 people. Maybe the other 879 people will live longer happier lives. Source: http://journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/2047487317723212

It's a self-fulfilling prophecy study

Re: Marijuana use holds three-fold blood pressure death risk: study

#63

Post by jrs95 » Thu, Aug 10, 2017, 4:49 PM UTC

The only case I've ever heard of someone dying from using marijuana was my grandfather. He was diabetic and ate too many sweets after getting the munchies. Honestly, probably how he would have wanted to go out anyways.

Re: Marijuana use holds three-fold blood pressure death risk: study

#64

Post by wfo » Thu, Aug 10, 2017, 4:50 PM UTC

Remember, studies like this are not opinion pieces about whether or not it should be legal. It's a substance that it has been illegal to study for decades, it's unsurprising there may be previously unknown health risks and it's important to try and understand them.

That being said,

>Support for liberal marijuana use is partly due to claims that it is beneficial and possibly not harmful to health

This is extremely disingenuous. No, support for liberal marijuana use is mostly due to claims that it is less harmful than current legal drugs like alcohol, cigarettes, caffeine, sugar (not that it is not harmful at all), that it has measurable and powerful medicinal uses, and that criminalization of it is the biggest US domestic-policy-based moral catastrophe in decades and has done horrific damage to entire cornerstones of American society (minority groups, the police, civil liberties, the legal system, public health) with the explicitly stated and accomplished goal of targeting political and racial groups.

>If marijuana use is implicated in cardiovascular diseases and deaths, then it rests on the health community and policy makers to protect the public.

No, this is disingenuous and extremely dangerous. If use is implicated in these diseases it rests on the health community and policy makers to educate the public about these risks so they may make informed choices, exactly as they do with alcohol and tobacco and caffeine and sugar and trans fats, and to insulate the public from dangers associated with others making these choices by preventing e.g. driving under the influence or secondary exposure.

Re: Marijuana use holds three-fold blood pressure death risk: study

#65

Post by dsfyu404ed » Thu, Aug 10, 2017, 4:50 PM UTC

devrandomguy wrote: post #20

Could the title be updated to indicate whether we are talking about smoking, or other means of ingestion? Smoke inhalation was already known to be bad, regardless of what the smoke was made from.

Even still, a group that eats more White Castle burgers and similar high sodium food than the rest of the population will have higher blood pressure than the rest of the population.

Re: Marijuana use holds three-fold blood pressure death risk: study

#66

Post by priam » Thu, Aug 10, 2017, 4:51 PM UTC

nxsynonym wrote: post #4

>> "If marijuana use is implicated in cardiovascular diseases and deaths, then it rests on the health community and policy makers to protect the public." Like how the policy makers protect the public from Alcohol, tobacco, and over-the-counter meds? Also a 1200 person study isn't really enough to draw any major conclusions from. Of course ingesting anything substance of any kind frequently over a period of time is bo…

>>> "Also a 1200 person study isn't really enough to draw any major conclusions from."

You can draw strong conclusions off of a smaller sample size.

This study is not conclusive, and the sensationalized headlines aren't helping.

Re: Marijuana use holds three-fold blood pressure death risk: study

#67

Post by darkerside » Thu, Aug 10, 2017, 4:51 PM UTC

It's confusing that the study had a breakdown of "Never", "Non-regular", and "Regular", but the results of the study don't seem to highlight whether the regular and non-regular groups had a similar or different result.

Re: Marijuana use holds three-fold blood pressure death risk: study

#68

Post by codehandle » Thu, Aug 10, 2017, 4:53 PM UTC

millzlane wrote: post #43

CJefferson wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Policy makers do put quite a lot of work into protecting us from alcohol, tobacco and over the counter meds. Also, 1200 people is a fairly huge study, plenty to get some quality statistics from. I'm not sure why you have been so offended by this research. It looks quite convincing to me, and fairly worrying.

>It looks quite convincing to me, and fairly worrying. That's how propaganda works. I know it's anecdotal, but I've been a 3 or more times a day (everyday) smoker for over 11.5 years and I'm an no where near the risk of my overweight family members. Blood pressure has been fine and I'm an no risk of hypertension. Demand more proof if you're convinced by this. Something smells fishy. I would like to know how Snoop, Wi…

> and I'm an no where near the risk of my overweight family members

Yep. The "three-fold" thing sounds awful but I didn't see the actual risk factor in the article. If it's 0.000001% and rises to 0.000003% that's a three-fold increase. If you're getting lots of other positive effects and quality of life effects from use then it may well be worth the risk.

Re: Marijuana use holds three-fold blood pressure death risk: study

#69

Post by hprotagonist » Thu, Aug 10, 2017, 4:54 PM UTC

I have not read the paper. Does it attempt to segregate smokers vs. edible users?

It seems kind of a no-brainer that inhaling combustion products is going to stress your cardiovascular system, so I'd be interested to see if there's also something about the physiological effects of THC/CBD/whatever-else-is-soluble-in-butter that leads to hypertension as well.

edit: The study controlled for those who had previously been diagnosed with high blood pressure. But it did not take other cardiovascular risk factors into account, including diet and exercise.

It also assumed that those who said they had used marijuana in 2005 continued to do so, and it assumed that users largely smoked their pot and didn't consume it in other ways, such as by eating marijuana-laced brownies.

Those caveats limit the study's validity, said Dr. Vinay Prasad, associate professor of medicine at Oregon Health & Science University and an expert on the design and results of medical studies.

"It does not prove that if you choose to use marijuana you are more likely to die of cardiovascular disease," Prasad said in an email. "I think the major limit of the study is that there may be unobserved differences between the people who used and admitted to using marijuana during the years of this study, and cardiovascular outcomes that the researchers did not adjust for. In fact, that is likely."

Oh. Nevermind. http://www.oregonlive.com/health/index.ssf/2017/08/study_lin...

Re: Marijuana use holds three-fold blood pressure death risk: study

#70

Post by gwern » Thu, Aug 10, 2017, 4:56 PM UTC

> The results showed marijuana users had a 3.42-times higher risk of death from hypertension than non-users, and a 1.04 greater risk for each year of use. There was no link between marijuana use and dying from heart or cerebrovascular diseases such as strokes.

Huh?