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In recent surveys, the majority of Americans feel that inhaling marijuana smoke is safer than inhaling smoke from tobacco. Most Americans also believe that there is less harm to both adults and children who are exposed to secondhand marijuana smoke than cigarette smoke.

Does science back up these growingly popular concepts? Nope, we are learning more about the risks of marijuana use at an amazing rate. The fact is, when you burn tobacco or cannabis, it creates carcinogens which are toxic as well as particulate matter that is harmful to one’s health.  There is a growing concept that because cannabis is “natural”, inhaling or burning it is fine. Again, that is simply not true.

It is a ridiculous concept to debate if smoking cannabis is safer than smoking cigarettes. That is no more useful than asking, ‘Is eating a box of cookies healthier than eating a cake?’ NO added smoke is safe for our health.

There were surveys analyzed from 2017, 2020, and 2021. They showed that American’s positive perception of marijuana increased each year. The last year of the survey, 2021 shows that over 44% thought cannabis was somewhat or much safer than cigarette smoke. How about the harm of secondhand marijuana smoke?  Over 40% thought smoke from marijuana was safer than cigarette smoke.

Friends, we have so much work to do. As health professionals, educators, parents, or grandparents, we need to have conversations about facts like these. It’s not preaching about how using these products is going to ruin our teen’s lives. It’s about taking advantage of organic conversations about what they are seeing at school and in their community. What their friends may or may not be doing. And always, with an open mind, have conversations where there is an opportunity to drop some knowledge.

Before Christmas, I had a mom tell me about this situation with her teenage daughter. Her daughter had asked her if she could have a personal diffuser.  Thinking it was something she would plug in and make her room smell like strawberries, Mom told her “Sure.” In a few days, the mom found her daughter in her room vaping what we now call “wellness vapes”.

Wellness vapes or “nutritional supplement diffusers” allow a user to inhale ingredients like vitamin B12, melatonin, caffeine, and many other options. These are usually slim, colorful cartridges, and names like Inhale Health and NutriAir. These products claim to do many things. There are options to help with sleep, give you energy, help with anxiety, and even fight ADHD. The fact of the matter is these products do not live up to their claim.  Here is the kicker, wellness vapes do not need FDA approval to be on the market. Why? They don’t contain nicotine, so the FDA has no control over these products.

The number and options for wellness vapes keep growing. They arrived on the market about four years ago. These products certainly hold something alluring and helpful to teens and undermine the efforts to encourage youth not to vape.

The FDA has warned that wellness vapes might well be dangerous. They may even trigger severe coughing and cause airways to tighten which could make breathing difficult. The simple truth is, it’s not ok to put anything unknown into our lungs.

Flavorings used in these products can cause lung damage and the propellants that send them into the lung will usually be propylene glycol and glycerin into the lungs and that is a medical concern.

Let’s be sure to include these products when talking to our youth about healthy choices. Help them understand that these products make many claims, but they are ineffective and at the worst, are likely to be harmful.

As we turn our eyes toward a new year and all it will bring. Let’s spend a few minutes looking at something relatively new, vaping cannabis. Unfortunately, we cannot go into depth explaining all the differences between CBD, THC, Deta-9, dabbing, blunts, chasing, and many other terms and important details to look at when discussing cannabis but we do need to understand several basic things.

How it works. Just like nicotine vaping devices, cannabis vapes work by heating a liquid or oil that becomes a vapor the user inhales. It is often difficult to tell a nicotine vape from a cannabis vape. Also, kids know how to hack them. I talked to a youth not long ago and he told me that he had a watermelon vape, used it till about half the vape was gone then opened it up and filled it with a THC liquid (he was very proud of himself). There are tons of YouTube showing how to do this.

We do need to know the difference between THC and CBD. THC is the psychoactive chemical compound in cannabis while CBD is non-psychoactive. There is also Delta-8 THC that can be sold as CBD. One thing all caregivers need to understand is this. Today’s cannabis is not the cannabis of the 60’s and 70’s. At the very least, 1 joint today is 10 times stronger than a joint in 1970. That means that for every 1 joint, you or your grandparent may have smoked, your child or grandchild would be smoking 10. Then you look at something like “dapping” where the cannabis is cooked down to a wax and is 80% stronger THC than a joint from the 1970s.

This brings us to the realities of the risks. I will highlight two of the vital organs at risk: the brain of the young person and their developing lungs. The brain of a young adult continues to grow into their early 20s and is busy developing critical skills related to problem-solving, impulse control, anticipating consequences, and more. Cannabis can get in the way of this critical development.

Several thousand lung injuries and deaths have been associated with an illness linked to vaping devices containing THC. Even though the CDC has stopped collecting this data, cases are still being recorded. Some symptoms to watch for are shortness of breath, fatigue, weight loss, and gastrointestinal problems.

In months to come, we will look at how we can address this issue with our youth.

This time of the year can certainly mean the weather is changing outside. There are songs like, “Baby It’s Cold Outside” or maybe “Colder Weather” by Zac Brown that remind us of cold weather.  But actually, I’m thinking of the efforts Big Tobacco is going through to keep the “cooling agent” in cigarettes and vapes on the market: MENTHOL.

See, the FDA, in October of this year, sent the White House final regulations to eliminate menthol nicotine products like e-cigarettes, cigarettes, and cigars. But Big Tobacco won’t give these products up without a fight. Menthol cigarettes reap more than a third of all annual cigarette sales from menthols and US sales of “ice” e-cigarettes have been increasing at an alarming rate, with US sales growing by more than 10 times from 2017-2021. What is even more alarming, in 2023, almost 58% of US kids who vape, use ice e-cigarettes.

Big Tobacco put up a major fight as California passed its flavor ban that included menthol. Now, they have multiple front groups like “Alliance for Fair and Equitable Policy” to post advertisements opposing the federal ban on menthol and placing them on popular podcasts and local targeted radio and social. These ads prompt their target audience to call the White House in protest of the FDA proposal.

So now, it’s time for all of us to use our voices. I encourage you to call the White House’s comment line and leave a message for President Biden. Support the FDA’s recommendations on eliminating the sale of menthol products. The phone number is: 202-456-1111.

May your days be merry and bright.