Consuming marijuana is relaxing, that’s something that most users can all agree. While there are a million different types of highs you can get from smoking or from consuming marijuana, relaxation and anxiety loss are always at the top of the list. Marijuana helps us let go of our inhibitions and to chill.
If you’re curious about what really happens to your body under the influence of marijuana, you can check out this comprehensive list by the National Academy of Science, Engineering and Medicine, where they went through all the available evidence of marijuana and gathered the most reliable facts on the effects of the plant on the human body.
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NASEM gathered that the illnesses that benefit the most from medical marijuana are chronic pain, muscle spasms, multiple sclerosis, sleep problems and the nausea caused by chemotherapy. The most common physical effects of the plant are bloodshot eyes, dilated pupils, temporary increase in heart rate, drowsiness, memory difficulty, distortion of time and changes in balance, posture and coordination.
The document also showed some less conclusive information on marijuana and the effect it can have on the heart and lungs. The comprehensive list found some links between cannabis and the prevention of diabetes, of increasing the risk of prediabetes, and of triggering a heart attack caused by smoking. There was no relation between cannabis and heart attacks. The review also found some surprising results in terms of lung health, finding no relationship between smoking cannabis and lung cancer. There was a negative link discovered, which was the correlation between long term cannabis smokers and the overproduction of mucus and coughing.
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When it comes to your immune system, it was reported that marijuana is an anti inflammatory. Negative side effects of this property were not found, although there were some correlations between daily smoking and liver damage in individuals with Hepatitis C, and of the reduction of pro-inflammatory compounds in healthy people.
The report is an impressive achievement that will surely aid in the coming studies of cannabis and its health benefits, but it’s important to know that human trials are severely lacking and that conclusive evidence can’t be made out of this NASEM report. For the better or worse, correlation does not mean causation.
