Marijuana Smoke Can Be as Harmful as Tobacco Smoke, if Not More Harmful

Despite popular beliefs that marijuana smoke is less harmful than tobacco smoke, researches in Canada say this not the case. Inhaling any type of smoke has toxic effects on human cells. When cultured animals cells were separately exposed to marijuana smoke and tobacco smoke, there were some interesting results and distinct differences. Marijuana smoke caused significantly more damage to animal cells and DNA than tobacco smoke, but tobacco smoke caused chromosome damage while marijuana did not. The researchers point out it is difficult to associate the potential roles of marijuana smoke in causing lung cancer because it is hard to find people who have only smoke marijuana in their life and not tobacco. http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2009/08/090805110741.html