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CNN
8 hours ago
- Health
- CNN
Marijuana use doubles risk of dying from heart disease, large study finds
Drugs in society Heart disease Chronic diseasesFacebookTweetLink Follow Get inspired by a weekly roundup on living well, made simple. Sign up for CNN's Life, But Better newsletter for information and tools designed to improve your well-being. Using marijuana doubles the risk of dying from heart disease, according to a new analysis of pooled medical data involving 200 million people mostly between the ages of 19 and 59. 'What was particularly striking was that the concerned patients hospitalized for these disorders were young (and thus, not likely to have their clinical features due to tobacco smoking) and with no history of cardiovascular disorder or cardiovascular risk factors,' said senior author Émilie Jouanjus, an associate professor of pharmacology at the University of Toulouse, France, in an email. Compared to nonusers, those who used cannabis also had a 29% higher risk for heart attacks and a 20% higher risk for stroke, according to the study published Tuesday in the journal Heart. 'This is one of the largest studies to date on the connection between marijuana and heart disease, and it raises serious questions about the assumption that cannabis imposes little cardiovascular risk,' said pediatrician Dr. Lynn Silver, a clinical professor of epidemiology and biostatistics at University of California, San Francisco. 'Getting this right is critically important because cardiovascular disease is the top cause of death both in the United States and globally,' said Silver, who is also senior adviser at the Public Health Institute, a nonprofit public health organization that analyzes marijuana policy and legalization. Silver is the coauthor of an editorial published with the paper that calls for change in how cannabis is viewed by health professionals, regulatory bodies and the public at large. 'Clinicians need to screen people for cannabis use and educate them about its harms, the same way we do for tobacco, because in some population groups it's being used more widely than tobacco,' she said. 'Our regulatory system, which has been almost entirely focused on creating legal infrastructure and licensing legal, for-profit (cannabis) businesses, needs to focus much more strongly on health warnings that educate people about the real risks.' The new systematic review and meta-analysis analyzed medical information from large, observational studies conducted in Australia, Egypt, Canada, France, Sweden and the US between 2016 and 2023. Those studies did not ask people how they used cannabis — such as via smoking, vaping, dabbing, edibles, tinctures or topicals. (Dabbing involves vaporizing concentrated cannabis and inhaling the vapor.) However, 'based on epidemiological data, it is likely that cannabis was smoked in the vast majority of cases,' Jouanjus said. Smoking tobacco is a well-known cause of heart disease — both the smoke and the chemicals in tobacco damage blood vessels and increase clotting, according to the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Therefore, it is not surprising that smoking, vaping or dabbing cannabis could do the same, Silver said: 'Any of the many ways of inhaling cannabis are going to have risks to the user, and there's also secondhand smoke risks, which are similar to tobacco.' The notion that smoking cannabis is less harmful because it's 'natural' is just wrong, Dr. Beth Cohen, professor of medicine at the University of California, San Francisco, told CNN in a prior interview. 'When you burn something, whether it is tobacco or cannabis, it creates toxic compounds, carcinogens, and particulate matter that are harmful to health,' Cohen said in an email. However, edibles may also play a role in heart disease, according to a May 2025 study. People who consumed edibles laced with tetrahydrocannabinol, or THC, showed signs of early cardiovascular disease similar to tobacco smokers. 'We found that vascular function was reduced by 42% in marijuana smokers and by 56% in THC-edible users compared to nonusers,' Dr. Leila Mohammadi, an assistant researcher in cardiology at the University of California, San Francisco, told CNN in a prior interview. None of the studies included in the new meta-analysis asked users about the potency of THC in the products they consume. Even if they had, that information would be quickly outdated, Silver said. 'The cannabis market is a moving target. It is getting more potent every day,' she said. 'What's being sold to people today in California is 510 times stronger than what it was in the 1970s. Concentrates can be 99% pure THC. Vapes are over 80% THC. 'A variety of chemically extracted cannabinoids can be almost pure THC, and all of these just have very different effects on people than smoking a joint in the 1970s.' Higher potency weed is contributing to a host of problems, including an increase in addiction — a July 2022 study found consuming high-potency weed was linked to a fourfold increased risk of dependence. In the United States, about 3 in 10 people who use marijuana have cannabis use disorder, the medical term for marijuana addiction, according to the CDC. 'We know that more potent cannabis makes people more likely to become addicted,' Silver said. 'We know that more potent cannabis makes people more likely to develop psychosis, seeing and hearing things that aren't there, or schizophrenia. Habitual users may also suffer from uncontrollable vomiting.' The rise in potency is one reason that the current study may not have captured the full extent of the risk of marijuana for heart disease, Jouanjus said: 'We are afraid that the association might be even stronger than that reported.' While science continues to study the risk, experts say it's time to think twice about the potential harms of cannabis use — especially if heart disease is a concern. 'If I was a 60-year-old person who had some heart disease risk, I would be very cautious about using cannabis,' Silver said. 'I've seen older people who are using cannabis for pain or for sleep, some of whom have significant cardiovascular risk, or who have had strokes or had heart attacks or had angina, and they have no awareness that this may be putting them at greater risk.'
CNN
9 hours ago
- Health
- CNN
Marijuana use doubles risk of dying from heart disease, large study finds
Drugs in society Heart disease Chronic diseasesFacebookTweetLink Follow Get inspired by a weekly roundup on living well, made simple. Sign up for CNN's Life, But Better newsletter for information and tools designed to improve your well-being. Using marijuana doubles the risk of dying from heart disease, according to a new analysis of pooled medical data involving 200 million people mostly between the ages of 19 and 59. 'What was particularly striking was that the concerned patients hospitalized for these disorders were young (and thus, not likely to have their clinical features due to tobacco smoking) and with no history of cardiovascular disorder or cardiovascular risk factors,' said senior author Émilie Jouanjus, an associate professor of pharmacology at the University of Toulouse, France, in an email. Compared to nonusers, those who used cannabis also had a 29% higher risk for heart attacks and a 20% higher risk for stroke, according to the study published Tuesday in the journal Heart. 'This is one of the largest studies to date on the connection between marijuana and heart disease, and it raises serious questions about the assumption that cannabis imposes little cardiovascular risk,' said pediatrician Dr. Lynn Silver, a clinical professor of epidemiology and biostatistics at University of California, San Francisco. 'Getting this right is critically important because cardiovascular disease is the top cause of death both in the United States and globally,' said Silver, who is also senior adviser at the Public Health Institute, a nonprofit public health organization that analyzes marijuana policy and legalization. Silver is the coauthor of an editorial published with the paper that calls for change in how cannabis is viewed by health professionals, regulatory bodies and the public at large. 'Clinicians need to screen people for cannabis use and educate them about its harms, the same way we do for tobacco, because in some population groups it's being used more widely than tobacco,' she said. 'Our regulatory system, which has been almost entirely focused on creating legal infrastructure and licensing legal, for-profit (cannabis) businesses, needs to focus much more strongly on health warnings that educate people about the real risks.' The new systematic review and meta-analysis analyzed medical information from large, observational studies conducted in Australia, Egypt, Canada, France, Sweden and the US between 2016 and 2023. Those studies did not ask people how they used cannabis — such as via smoking, vaping, dabbing, edibles, tinctures or topicals. (Dabbing involves vaporizing concentrated cannabis and inhaling the vapor.) However, 'based on epidemiological data, it is likely that cannabis was smoked in the vast majority of cases,' Jouanjus said. Smoking tobacco is a well-known cause of heart disease — both the smoke and the chemicals in tobacco damage blood vessels and increase clotting, according to the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Therefore, it is not surprising that smoking, vaping or dabbing cannabis could do the same, Silver said: 'Any of the many ways of inhaling cannabis are going to have risks to the user, and there's also secondhand smoke risks, which are similar to tobacco.' The notion that smoking cannabis is less harmful because it's 'natural' is just wrong, Dr. Beth Cohen, professor of medicine at the University of California, San Francisco, told CNN in a prior interview. 'When you burn something, whether it is tobacco or cannabis, it creates toxic compounds, carcinogens, and particulate matter that are harmful to health,' Cohen said in an email. However, edibles may also play a role in heart disease, according to a May 2025 study. People who consumed edibles laced with tetrahydrocannabinol, or THC, showed signs of early cardiovascular disease similar to tobacco smokers. 'We found that vascular function was reduced by 42% in marijuana smokers and by 56% in THC-edible users compared to nonusers,' Dr. Leila Mohammadi, an assistant researcher in cardiology at the University of California, San Francisco, told CNN in a prior interview. None of the studies included in the new meta-analysis asked users about the potency of THC in the products they consume. Even if they had, that information would be quickly outdated, Silver said. 'The cannabis market is a moving target. It is getting more potent every day,' she said. 'What's being sold to people today in California is 510 times stronger than what it was in the 1970s. Concentrates can be 99% pure THC. Vapes are over 80% THC. 'A variety of chemically extracted cannabinoids can be almost pure THC, and all of these just have very different effects on people than smoking a joint in the 1970s.' Higher potency weed is contributing to a host of problems, including an increase in addiction — a July 2022 study found consuming high-potency weed was linked to a fourfold increased risk of dependence. In the United States, about 3 in 10 people who use marijuana have cannabis use disorder, the medical term for marijuana addiction, according to the CDC. 'We know that more potent cannabis makes people more likely to become addicted,' Silver said. 'We know that more potent cannabis makes people more likely to develop psychosis, seeing and hearing things that aren't there, or schizophrenia. Habitual users may also suffer from uncontrollable vomiting.' The rise in potency is one reason that the current study may not have captured the full extent of the risk of marijuana for heart disease, Jouanjus said: 'We are afraid that the association might be even stronger than that reported.' While science continues to study the risk, experts say it's time to think twice about the potential harms of cannabis use — especially if heart disease is a concern. 'If I was a 60-year-old person who had some heart disease risk, I would be very cautious about using cannabis,' Silver said. 'I've seen older people who are using cannabis for pain or for sleep, some of whom have significant cardiovascular risk, or who have had strokes or had heart attacks or had angina, and they have no awareness that this may be putting them at greater risk.'
The Guardian
9 hours ago
- Health
- The Guardian
Cannabis use could double risk of heart deaths, study suggests
Cannabis use may double the risk of dying from heart disease and increase the risk of stroke by 20%, according to a global review of data. The number of people using cannabis and cannabinoids has soared over the past decade. While previous studies have linked cannabis use to cardiovascular problems, the scale of the risk has until now not been clear. This is an important gap in light of major changes in consumption, researchers at the University of Toulouse in France said. To strengthen the evidence base, they searched databases looking for large observational studies, published between 2016 and 2023, which explored cannabis use and cardiovascular outcomes. Twenty-four studies, involving about 200 million people, were included in a pooled data analysis of the results: 17 cross-sectional studies, six cohort studies, and one case-control study. Study participants were mostly aged between 19 and 59. And in those studies where sex was recorded, cannabis users tended to be mostly male and younger than non-users. The analysis revealed heightened risks for cannabis use: 29% higher for acute coronary syndrome; 20% higher for stroke; and a doubling in the risk of dying from cardiovascular disease. The findings were published in the journal Heart. The researchers acknowledged several limitations to their systematic review and meta analysis. There was a moderate to high risk of bias in most of the included studies, largely because of lack of information on missing data and imprecise measures of cannabis exposure. Most of them were observational and several used the same data. Sign up to Headlines UK Get the day's headlines and highlights emailed direct to you every morning after newsletter promotion With these caveats, the researchers said their work was an exhaustive analysis of published data on the potential association between cannabis use and major cardiovascular disease and provided new insights from real-world data. 'The findings outlined by this meta analysis should enhance the general awareness of the potential of cannabis to cause cardiovascular harm.' In a linked editorial, Prof Stanton Glantz and Dr Lynn Silver of the University of California at San Francisco said the analysis 'raises serious questions about the assumption that cannabis imposes little cardiovascular risk'. More research is needed to clarify whether cardiovascular risks are limited to inhaled products or extend to other forms of cannabis exposure, they said. Cannabis is now generally more potent and has diversified into a wide array of inhaled high potency cannabis concentrates, synthetic psychoactive cannabinoids, and edibles, they added. They wrote: 'How these changes affect cardiovascular risk requires clarification, as does the proportion of risk attributable to cannabinoids themselves versus particulate matter, terpenes or other components of the exposure. 'Cannabis needs to be incorporated into the framework for prevention of clinical cardiovascular disease. So too must cardiovascular disease prevention be incorporated into the regulation of cannabis markets. Effective product warnings and education on risks must be developed, required, and implemented. 'Cardiovascular and other health risks must be considered in the regulation of allowable product and marketing design as the evidence base grows. Today that regulation is focused on establishing the legal market with woeful neglect of minimising health risks. 'Specifically, cannabis should be treated like tobacco: not criminalised, but discouraged, with protection of bystanders from secondhand exposure.'
CBS News
9 hours ago
- Health
- CBS News
Cannabis use linked to a doubled risk of heart disease death, new study finds
New study links marijuana use to increased risk of heart attack and stroke With growing marijuana use across the country, studies have looked at the link between cannabis use and cardiovascular problems — but new research is showing the magnitude of such risk. In the study, published Tuesday in the journal Heart, researchers found cannabis use is linked to a doubled risk of dying from cardiovascular disease, a 29% higher risk for acute coronary syndrome and 20% higher risk for stroke. The authors analyzed data from 24 studies published from 2016 to 2023. "Our results provide a fully comprehensive report of the recent situation towards the cardiovascular health of cannabis users," the authors wrote, but added there were some study limitations, including potential imprecise dosage measurements. With recreational marijuana legal in 24 states, the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration is moving to reclassify the drug to a less dangerous category under the Controlled Substances Act. Daily marijuana users now outnumber daily drinkers for the first time ever, according to a Carnegie Mellon University report last year. The preference shift is largely being driven by young people. For example, 69% of people aged 18 to 24 prefer marijuana to alcohol, according to a 2022 survey by New Frontier Data, a cannabis research firm. Due to increased usage, the perception of risk around marijuana has declined, health experts Dr. Lynn Silver of the Public Health Institute and Stanton Glantz, emeritus professor of the University of California at San Francisco, write in an editorial note that was published alongside the research, but the results of the study highlight the potential health effects. In the note, the authors called for the drug to "be treated like tobacco: not criminalized but discouraged," including added protection of bystanders from secondhand exposure. They also called for more research on whether cardiovascular risks are limited to inhaled products, which made up the majority of cases in the meta-analysis, or extend to other forms of cannabis exposure.
Gizmodo
9 hours ago
- Health
- Gizmodo
Yet Another Study Finds Weed Is Bad for Your Heart
In recent years, weed use among U.S. adults has reached an all-time high. While many laud this drug as safe, natural, and even medicinal, a growing body of evidence suggests it contributes to adverse cardiovascular effects—including deadly heart disease. A new study published in the journal Heart on Tuesday, June 17, presents new evidence showing that marijuana use doubles the risk of dying from cardiovascular disease. The researchers found particularly heightened risks of stroke and acute coronary syndrome (ACS)—a sudden reduction in blood flow to the heart, such as a heart attack. While previous studies have linked cannabis to cardiovascular problems, this research underscores the severity of these risks. The authors note, however, that future studies will need to verify this link and investigate the mechanisms behind it. The findings may come as a shock to those who consider weed a harmless high, but co-author Emilie Jouanjus, a clinical pharmacologist at the University of Toulouse in France, was not surprised. She's been studying the adverse health effects of marijuana for more than a decade and hopes this study will promote better decision-making around marijuana use. 'I think that it's very important that people realize that there is risk, even if it's a natural product,' Jouanjus told Gizmodo. Over the last decade, increased state legalization has made weed more accessible and less stigmatized, contributing to a rise in recreational and medicinal use. Jouanjus and her colleagues argue that public health messaging should treat cannabis like tobacco—not criminalizing it, but actively highlighting its risks and discouraging use. The researchers analyzed 24 studies, conducted between January 2016 and December 2023, that investigated the link between marijuana use and serious cardiovascular outcomes. These studies involved roughly 200 million participants mostly between the ages of 19 and 59. They specifically looked at cardiovascular disease death and non-fatal outcomes including stroke and ACS. The analysis found that cannabis use increases the risk of ACS by 29%, risk of stroke by 20%, and doubles the risk of dying from cardiovascular disease. While the researchers say their study provides an exhaustive analysis of the available data on marijuana use and cardiovascular disease, Jouanjus noted that the included studies were limited by a lack of data on when and how participants were exposed to cannabis. This leaves several important questions unanswered, such as, at what dosage does cannabis become unsafe? Are the cardiovascular risks lower for occasional marijuana users? Is consuming edibles safer than smoking weed? Jouanjus hopes future studies will explore these questions. Some researchers have already begun, like Matt Springer, a cardiovascular researcher at the University of California San Francisco. Springer co-authored a recent study, published in the journal JAMA Cardiology in May, that found both smoking weed and eating edibles increase risk of cardiovascular disease. The finding challenges widespread assumptions that edibles are a less-harmful way to consume marijuana and underscores the drug's alarming cardiovascular effects. Like Jouanjus, Springer wasn't surprised by the link between cannabis use and cardiovascular disease death. 'This is consistent with several reports in the last few years showing associations between cannabis use and various kinds of cardiovascular outcomes, as well as another recent meta-analysis reported at the [American College of Cardiology] conference in March,' he told Gizmodo in an email. That study found that cannabis users face significantly higher risk of heart attack than non-users. Springer's latest study found that cannabis users showed reduced blood vessel dilation, which puts them at greater risk of heart attack and other poor cardiovascular outcomes. In theory, this could contribute to the increased risk of cardiovascular disease death that Jouanjus and her colleagues found, he said, but researchers need more evidence to support that claim. There are other potential mechanisms, too. Jouanjus pointed to previous research that found that, like tobacco, cannabis contributes to buildup of plaque within artery walls. This increases the risk of heart attack, stroke, and peripheral artery disease. She also highlighted that the psychoactive compound in marijuana—tetrahydrocannabinol (THC)—is far more concentrated in cannabis products today than those from 20 years ago. This, too, may contribute to the increased risk of cardiovascular death she observed in her study. While all of these factors could plausibly influence weed's cardiovascular effects, getting to the bottom of why this drug damages heart health will require more research. In the meantime, Jouanjus feels there is enough evidence to warrant caution and moderation when using marijuana. The public is well aware of the benefits of cannabis, but she hopes her study can draw attention to its risks, too. Springer agrees, 'These reports over the last few years, including ours and this paper, indicate that cannabis is not necessarily harmless,' he said.
