Study links smoking pot to testicular cancer

[Teucer]

Author: AAP

Date: Feb 10, 2009

Source: www.brisbanetimes.com.au

Copyright: Fairfax I s'pose. Maybe AAP?

 

Young men who smoke marijuana are more likely to develop an aggressive form of testicular cancer than those who have never tried the drug, a study has found.

 

British newspapers on Monday reported the US research was the first to find evidence of a link between cannabis and testicular cancer.

 

It found smoking the drug at least once a week, or using it regularly from adolescence, doubled the risk of a fast-growing form of the disease called nonseminoma, which tends to strike men in their 20s and 30s.

 

The study, by scientists at the Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center in Seattle and published in the journal Cancer, asked 369 testicular cancer patients if they had a history of marijuana use.

 

A further 979 healthy men were asked about their use of the drug.

 

Being an existing cannabis user raised the risk of cancer by 70 per cent, while men who had used the drug regularly from puberty were twice as likely to develop the disease than those who had not used it.

 

Epidemiologist and study author Stephen Schwartz said: "Our study is not the first to suggest that some aspect of a man's lifestyle or environment is a risk factor for testicular cancer, but it is the first that has looked at marijuana use".

 

Researchers suggest cannabis may interfere with a man's natural production of a substance thought to protect against tumours.

Edited February 9, 2009 by Teucer

[RooR.USA.in.Oz]

sigh cancer

[Teucer]

Yup. The big scary C. The second largest and profitable industry in the world (after big oil).

 

You get a disease and they think the best way to cure it is to destroy the immune system with powerful radioactive drugs.

 

Doesn't anyone else see the irony in this?

[bighit]

oh well thats just dandy.... i'm screwed

[thedarkestone]

Not only is my brain going to fry, but my nuts are going to turn into prunes too. I'm so sick of all these so called studies. Oh well - only one thing to do.

[grace]

Not only is my brain going to fry, but my nuts are going to turn into prunes too. I'm so sick of all these so called studies. Oh well - only one thing to do.

 

you forget to mention impotency and that you're going to get man boobs

 

poor fellas ...

[freddie]

you forget to mention impotency and that you're going to get man boobs

 

poor fellas ...

I feel so much better now..

 

To put this in perspective:

The lifetime risk of a Queensland man developing testicular cancer is one in 240.

* In 2001, 17 Australian men died from testicular cancer. ¹

* In 2004, 6 Queensland men died from testicular cancer. ²

http://www.cancerqld.org.au/reduce_risk/de...rstatistics.asp

 

Those statistics would of course include stoners.

Edited February 10, 2009 by freddie

[Nooby]

Also, you missed this.

 

https://cannabis.community.forums.ozstoners...mp;#entry215856

[Pebbz]

Yeh and where's the study to show how smoking marijuana can help slow the growth of a variety of different cancers and tumors. There are definatetly cases out there which support this fact.

They will never do that study... If smoking marijuana was the answer to one of the worlds biggest problems... then what? pharmecutical companies would go out of business, the federal police would not get the billion dollar funding they do to fight the war on drugs, doctors and surgeons would not get paid the hefty salaries they do in treating the multitude of cancer patients every year, scientists would not get their government funded grants to research yet another thing that causes cancer, the media would not longer be able to scare you with stories about whats right and wrong, thereby losing their control over the way we live our lives, and marijuana would lose it's reputation as a dangerous and illegal substance. Oh dear, how tragic that would be. I can totally understand how a study into marijuana helping slow the spread of cancers would be a bad idea.

 

Pebbz

[grace]

Yeh and where's the study to show how smoking marijuana can help slow the growth of a variety of different cancers and tumors.

Pebbz

 

Hey Pebbz, there is already some great cannabis research being conducted in Australia.

Hopefully there will be news of more commencing very soon

 

The Cannabinoid Science Research Group at the University of Sydney is conducting a diverse range of research related to cannabis and the cannabinoids.

 

Anticancer actions of cannabinoids

 

One of this group's primary research interests is studying the anticancer effects of plant-derived, endogenous and synthetic cannabinoid compounds. This group is investigating the antiproliferative effects of cannabinoids on a range of human cancer cell lines. In addition, with the increasing use cannabis by chemotherapy patients as a palliative care agent, it is important to know whether these drugs modulate multidrug resistance (MDR). MDR is a common reason for treatment failure in cancer patients. This group is currently investigating the effects of cannabinoids on the most characterised MDR transporter, p-glycoprotein.

 

http://www.bosch.org.au/research/NervousSy...ience/index.php