The Surprising Effects of Marijuana on Body Fat: Potential Health Costs Outweigh Benefits

(Taiwan English News / Comprehensive report by Huang Ziti) Typical Huma addicts often feel hungry, but they are often less likely to gain weight, and even less prone to type 2 diabetes. Is there such a good thing? Experts warn that if you think smoking marijuana will lose weight and gain such health benefits, then you are very wrong.

Fortune Health(Fortune Well) reported that since many marijuana smokers became addicted in their teenage years, in order to study the impact of marijuana on the human body, the University of California, Irvine (UCI) tested the main psychoactive substance of marijuana – tetrahydrocannabinol (THC) ), inject a small amount into the “juvenile experimental mice”, and stop the injection after they develop into “adult mice”.

However, the damage has been done.

According to the researchers, adult rats that had ingested THC as teenagers had lower body fat mass, more lean mass, higher body temperature, and less obesity or hyperglycemia. health status.

However, the rats’ ability to convert fat into energy was also impaired. Therefore, its ability to act and think is not as good as that of ordinary mice, and it is difficult to concentrate. And these symptoms can also appear in humans who often smoke marijuana.

The reason for this physiological change has surprised the researchers. They found that in rats fed THC over a long period of time, body fat began to make proteins that are only found in muscles and hearts. At the same time, muscle cells fail to do their job of making the proteins they should. In other words, fat cells that are busy producing “heterogeneous” proteins have no time to function normally and healthily, causing them to lose their proper function of storing and releasing nutrients.

True, marijuana consumption may lower BMI and reduce the risk of cardiometabolic disease, but the findings of this experiment come at a staggering cost, which is permanently disrupting organ function and causing unimaginable harm to physical and mental health .

However, this research does not apply to those who started smoking marijuana in adulthood. The researchers also called for further research to explore the possible effects of THC on other organ systems.

The study was published on the 2nd in “cell metabolism“(Cell Metabolism) journal.