A new study indicates that individuals with cannabis use disorder are up to five times more likely to develop head and neck cancer compared to non-users.
A study conducted by the USC Head and Neck Center, part of Keck Medicine of USC and the USC Caruso Department of Otolaryngology – Head and Neck Surgery, indicates a link between cannabis use, the most widely used illicit substance globally, and a higher risk of developing head and neck cancer.
A large, multicenter study published in JAMA Otolaryngology – Head & Neck Surgery revealed that adults with cannabis dependence, known as cannabis use disorder, are 3.5 to 5 times more likely to develop head and neck cancer than those who do not use the substance.
“This is one of the first studies — and the largest that we know of to date — to associate head and neck cancer with cannabis use,” said Niels Kokot, MD, a head and neck surgeon with the USC Head and Neck Center and senior author of the study. “The detection of this risk factor is important because head and neck cancer may be preventable once people know which behaviors increase their risk.”
Kokot is also a professor of otolaryngology – head and neck surgery at the Keck School of Medicine of USC.
Broader Implications
Head and neck cancer, the sixth most common cancer in the world, includes several cancers, including cancer of the mouth, pharynx, larynx, oropharynx (tongue and tonsils and back wall of the throat), and adjacent salivary glands.
The researchers, including lead study author Tyler Gallagher, an MD/MPH candidate at the Keck School, discovered that those with cannabis use disorder had higher rates of all types of head and neck cancers. They also found that the prevalence of head and neck cancer among those with cannabis use disorder was independent of other factors, such as age, gender, and ethnicity. Alcohol and tobacco use, which have been associated with head and neck cancer, also did not play a role in the findings.
Potential Causes and Future Research
Kokot and his fellow researchers hypothesize that the primary reason cannabis raises the risk of head and neck cancer is because of the damaging effect of the smoke. Cannabis is primarily consumed through inhalation (even though the study did not distinguish between methods of consumption). Additionally, research has shown that tobacco smoke contains numerous chemicals that cause DNA damage and inflammation to the area, which, if unchecked, can lead to cancer, and they speculate that cannabis smoke may cause similar harm.
In fact, there is some evidence, Kokot theorizes, that the smoke from cannabis may even be worse than tobacco smoke.
“Cannabis smoking is typically unfiltered and involves deeper inhalation compared to tobacco,” he said. “Additionally, cannabis burns at a higher temperature than tobacco, increasing the risk of cancer-causing inflammation.”
Kokot would like to see further research examining the link between cannabis and head and neck cancer. In the meantime, he hopes this study will help people make more informed choices and raise awareness about the link between head and neck cancer and cannabis use.
To reach their conclusions, the researchers compiled 20 years of data through a health research network of 64 healthcare organizations that accounted for more than 90 million individuals. They tracked cancer cases from one to five years of cannabis use.
Reference: “Cannabis Use and Head and Neck Cancer” by Tyler J. Gallagher, Ryan S. Chung, Matthew E. Lin, Ian Kim and Niels C. Kokot, 8 August 2024, JAMA Otolaryngology–Head & Neck Surgery.
DOI: 10.1001/jamaoto.2024.2419
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15 Comments
Anything you do in Excesis is bad for you do things moderately. If you drink, drink moderately. If You drink don’t Drive, if you Drive don’t drink. If you Smoke, Smoke moderately. Moderate smoking can not kills you. Except if your body and your DNA has been damage before, through some other chemicals you are using every day. This chemicals you are using every day like soap to washes your body and Skin, like toothpaste and toothbrushes, you use to brush your teeth, like many other chemicals. Includes creme to rub your skin, this Soaps or chemicals is dangerous and doing damage to your body and your DNA this make your body and your DNA acceptable to Sickness and other Deasesses. So pardoned me. This chemicals causes Cancer, Skin and body cancer, mouth and throat cancer and Pain. Many people have die from Opioid they were taking because of the pain they are having. Many of all this is cursing by using chemicals every every day. When you use soap or chemicals to washes your Clothing and you will use or where those clout against your body and your skin and you are complaining about Skin and body cancer, individuals need to be using his or her common sense to Survives for long time. Thanks. To be continued. M. Luke.
Correct they call it living 😁
A good research. Hope it takes hold, but I don’t think anything will sway the pothead community. They’re too well entrenched in their belief that “just because it’s illegal, it must be good”.
Yes, unfortunately. Whatever the reason people smoke pot, including dealing with other medical conditions (migraine headaches, nausea, glaucoma, etc.), there will always be those who also see it as the politically correct thing to do. And the long term effects on their mental and physical health are something they never consider until the day comes when a doctor gives them the bad news.
Absurd, people have used cannabis for thousands of years and never got cancer until they used it in a world filled with toxic food, air, and water. I’m sure big pharmaceutical companies fund these studies to make sure people don’t realize they don’t need half the pills they take if they used cannabis instead. Why doesn’t Willy Nelson or Snoop Dogg have cancer yet? BS
Cancer is caused by human hands and additives . Cannabis has never been so politically attacked – Get real. It’s the money in cannabis that makes it that way . Growing in your yard with no treatments is perfectly fine. Commercial cannabis is made with extra garbage just like tobacco and their scam. Science is what should lead not political agenda.
You need to focus on what the word “risk” means here. It means “percentage of people”. It means that the percentage of potheads that get cancer is five times greater than the percentage of people who don’t use pot.
Now, you may be right that pot was less dangerous in the ancient times, but we don’t really know as there are no medical records from the ancient times. And between then and now a lot has changed anyway: the way of use, the way cannabis is being grown, the evolution of variants. Maybe it’s the synthetic fertilizers and pesticides in them that are the real killers, who knows.
But there are more risks to pot than just cancer. There’s impotence and there’s induced paranoia, for example. And you can develop dependence, too. That’s all nasty. Not as nasty as cancer, perhaps, but a reason enough to never touch the stuff, Dogg or no Dogg.
The point of my first paragraph was that Snoop Dogg and Willie Nelson haven’t found themselves on the bad side of the statistics.
The problem with this article and perhaps even with the original paper is that it only discusses increased risk and not absolute probability. A 5X increase from a 10% probability is much more sobering than a 5X increase from a base of 1 chance in a million. This lack of this vital information has allowed others to comment that the risk can’t be real because a couple of their friends haven’t gotten cancer yet. Well Hank Aaron didn’t hit a home run every time he went to bat and every drunk driver doesn’t kill someone when they drive drunk. I like to be able to weigh the costs against the benefits. Nevertheless, I am happiest when the odds are stacked in my favor.
20 years research and you still doubt? In 1945, medical doctors knew smoking tobacco caused cancers but no one believed them, because greed lobbied against truth. Greed of the canabis merchants will be lobbied…to their deaths. Death merchants.
Correct they call it living 😁
Interesting comments, basically one third of cancers are caused by your environment and choices you make, while the other two thirds are caused by random transcription errors, radiation, and your susceptibility based on a bad combination of alleles in your DNA. It is funny if you grow it must be okay. How does that rule work with choke cherry pits, four of those contain a LD50 level of cyanide. If you consider the energetic particles that you are hitting your body each second, about 3,000, you can get a picture of one of the larger insults the body must deal with. The geometry of today’s semiconductors is in the nanometer and picometer ranges, these are routinely corrupted by alpha particles causing bits to be flipped randomly in data, instruction, and restoration stacks. These alpha induced errors can be identified, usually quickly and usually corrected, we are also able to repair some DNA errors, but nearly simultaneous errors in a base and another critical component may allow a cascading of that error. Some of these make no difference, some do, your odds at Russian roulette are worse, but what sort of moderation is, with all due consideration, harmless? Life expectancy didn’t get here because tobacco and alcohol use are benign.
Interesting comments yourself, John. However, for me, it first begs this question: “Which came first, the cancer or the smoking?” Also, why is pot illegal when MSG is not? Statistically, I’ve found, a much smaller percentage of Americans die from cancers than from FDA approved food poisoning (e.g., soy, TBHQ and MSG by 1980, minimally). However, an even greater problem is undiagnosed nearly subclinical non-IgE-mediated food allergies (e.g., Arthur F. Coca, MD, by 1935). As a lay adult lifetime non-smoker raised in smoking household (with no lung cancers) with a family and personal history of food allergies and exposed to smoke on the job and in public spaces until those were banned, I have never been made as ill from tobacco smoke as I have from added MSG. I believe the pieces of the puzzle the so-called “experts” are missing are ‘tobacco allergy’ and ‘cannabis allergy;’ no allergy, no MSG, few cancers.
Right, and smokers never suffer from chronic pneumonia, bronchitis, emphysema , COPD, etc., either.
Prop 65 in California has stated that marijuana smoking is a carcinogen and mutagen but is denied from the cannabis industry and users, just like tobacco. I can not wait for the lawsuits.