States around the country — more than 20 in total — have legalized medical marijuana.
Experts have been changing their minds too — recently, CNN's chief medical correspondent Sanjay Gupta reversed his opinion on medical marijuana.
While recreational pot usage is controversial, many people agree with Gupta's new stance, and believe that the drug should be legal for medical uses.
And even though the benefits of smoking pot may be overstated by advocates of marijuana legalization, new laws will help researchers study the drug's medicinal uses and better understand how it impacts the body.
Currently only 6% of studies on marijuana analyze its medicinal properties.
Keep in mind, though, that there are negative effects of smoking too much pot or using it for non-medicinal purposes. When overused or abused, pot can lead to dependency and mess with your memory and emotions.
There are at least two active chemicals in marijuana that researchers think have medicinal applications. Those are cannabidiol (CBD) — which seems to impact the brain without a high— and tetrahydrocannabinol (THC) — which has pain relieving (and other) properties.
Experts have been changing their minds too — recently, CNN's chief medical correspondent Sanjay Gupta reversed his opinion on medical marijuana.
While recreational pot usage is controversial, many people agree with Gupta's new stance, and believe that the drug should be legal for medical uses.
And even though the benefits of smoking pot may be overstated by advocates of marijuana legalization, new laws will help researchers study the drug's medicinal uses and better understand how it impacts the body.
Currently only 6% of studies on marijuana analyze its medicinal properties.
Keep in mind, though, that there are negative effects of smoking too much pot or using it for non-medicinal purposes. When overused or abused, pot can lead to dependency and mess with your memory and emotions.
There are at least two active chemicals in marijuana that researchers think have medicinal applications. Those are cannabidiol (CBD) — which seems to impact the brain without a high— and tetrahydrocannabinol (THC) — which has pain relieving (and other) properties.
Also keep in mind that some of these health benefits can potentially be gained by taking THC pills like Dronabinol, a synthetic form of THC, which in some ways might be more effective than smoked marijuana.
It can be used to treat Glaucoma.
Marijuana use can be used to treat and prevent the eye disease glaucoma, which increases pressure in the eyeball, damaging the optic nerve and causing loss of vision.
Marijuana decreases the pressure inside the eye, according to the National Eye Institute: "Studies in the early 1970s showed that marijuana, when smoked, lowered intraocular pressure (IOP) in people with normal pressure and those with glaucoma."
These effects of the drug may slow the progression of the disease, preventing blindness.
It may help reverse the carcinogenic effects of tobacco and improve lung health.
According to a study published in Journal of the American Medical Association in January 2012, marijuana does not impair lung function and can even increase lung capacity.
Researchers looking for risk factors of heart disease tested the lung function of 5,115 young adults over the course of 20 years. Tobacco smokers lost lung function over time, but pot users actually showed an increase in lung capacity.
It's possible that the increased lung capacity maybe due to taking a deep breaths while inhaling the drug and not from a therapeutic chemical in the drug.
Read Full Article Here: 23 Health Benefits Of Marijuana
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