study-links-cannabis-use-to-dna-damage-cancer-risk

A recent study indicates that consuming cannabis may harm our body's cells and elevate the likelihood of developing highly cancerous tumours.

 

The research, featured in the journal Addiction Biology, characterises cannabis as a “genotoxic” agent due to its capacity to damage the genetic material within cells. This damage can result in DNA mutations, faster ageing, and cancer.

 

Worryingly, this genotoxic effect can be transmitted to future generations through impaired egg and sperm, indicating that the risks associated with cannabis use can span across generations, according to scholars from the University of Western Australia.

 

Additionally, the study connected the established understanding that cannabis consumption disrupts cellular energy production by affecting mitochondria with recent findings in cancer research that suggest mitochondrial dysfunction can lead to chromosome damage, increasing the incidence of cancer, accelerated ageing, and congenital abnormalities.

 

“The link we've described between cannabis use and genotoxicity has far-reaching consequences. This new research shows how genetic damage from cannabis use can be passed down the generations,” said Dr Stuart Reece from the varsity

 

Cannabis has been associated with micronuclear development and mitochondrial inhibition for a considerable period. 

 

Research involving both humans and rodents indicates that exposure to cannabis in adulthood is related to the occurrence of autism and challenges in cerebral processing among children who were exposed prenatally. 

 

Nevertheless, the study claimed that the genotoxic effects of cannabinoids have historically been “neglected.”

 

The researchers noted that “it may, in fact, be all around us through the rapid induction of ageing of eggs, sperm, zygotes, foetus and adult organisms with many lines of evidence demonstrating transgenerational impacts”.

 

Together, the data is clear and robust evidence for the transgenerational transmission of major genotoxic outcomes.

 

In light of this, Reece called on policymakers to “reframe the discussion surrounding cannabis legalisation from a personal choice to one that potentially involves multiple subsequent generations.”