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Cannabis use associated with quadrupled risk of developing type 2 diabetes
- mitchbob 1y agohttps://archive.ph/kmLlt https://archive.ph/kmLlt
- bitwize 1y ago"The munchies" have unpleasant sequelae...
- m0llusk 1y agoExactly what is going on here appears to be more complicated than that. For example: https://www.medicalnewstoday.com/articles/325050 https://www.medicalnewstoday.com/articles/325050 Title: Marijuana users less likely to be overweight or have obesity Opening line: New research finds that, despite the common phenomenon of having “the munchies” after using marijuana, cannabis users tend to weigh less and are less likely to be obese. This involved 33k participants in the US, so at least one order of magnitude smaller and in a different context.
- leoh 1y agovery confusing results around this the last few years https://www.veriheal.com/blog/study-women-who-consume-a-lot-of-cannabis-have-lower-risk-of-diabetes/ https://www.veriheal.com/blog/study-women-who-consume-a-lot-... there needs to be a paper that reconciles conflicting findings.
- homeonthemtn 1y agoWonder if cannabis triggers blood sugar level changes which causes the munchies. I have funky blood sugar issues, and I can certainly see the overlap in how the cravings feel but never made the connection until now. Very interesting.
- Fade_Dance 1y agoSeems to me that that would have been known/measured by now if it was the case. Fairly easy to measure.
- AngryData 1y agoThere does seem to be an effect on blood sugar levels, but apparently not in a simple way because studies struggle to get consistent results. It seems like it lowers it a little bit, atleast at first, but many people spend far more time with excess sugar levels, possibly due to eating in response. Anecdotally it always seemed to me that it didn't make you that hungry straight out, but it did depress the feeling of satiation after eating so it is much easier to binge on food once you start eating something.
- deleted 1y ago[deleted]
- xenobeb 1y agoI have never found a study that supports this. The research is pretty clear this is from ghrelin stimulating appetite and at the same time altering levels of leptin so a person feels less full. It is not from a blood sugar crash. While some studies link lower BMI, meta analysis shows cannabis is kind of a disaster if you are trying to lose weight. It is hard to make generalizations though because it is so different if you smoke once a month, once a week or once a day.
- imchillyb 1y ago> The authors note that more research is needed on the long-term endocrine effects of cannabis use and whether diabetes risks are limited to inhaled products or other forms of cannabis such as edibles. This study did not differentiate between edibles, which are loaded with sugar, and inhaled cannabis usage. And, since they are not a food product, edibles do not carry the same onus as food for labeling, nor similar regulatory oversight. This seems a significant flaw in the data gathering and could change the ultimate conclusion of the study.
- leptons 1y agoNot all edibles have sugar, but most seem to be pure candy. It's dangerous too because if the edible tastes so amazing you want to eat another one and then you get way too high. That's why when I used to make "magic brownies" I would make two batches, one of them "plain", so I could eat those after eating the magic one. Level Protabs are pretty amazing, so clean and zero sugar. It's literally just THC and a little bit of corn starch pressed into a pill. I break them in half and it gives me a focused creativity boost.
- deleted 1y ago[deleted]
- yosame 1y agoEdibles wouldn't have enough sugar to singularly cause diabetes.
- cactusplant7374 1y agoIs it really possible to get diabetes from eating one piece of candy every day?
- gabrielhfrn 1y agoWhen you frame it that way, it almost brings the study's findings into question! I wonder if it was truly a flaw or if it was a calculated omission.
- DontchaKnowit 1y ago
- bb88 1y ago> The researchers found that new cases of diabetes were significantly higher in the cannabis group (1,937; 2.2%) compared to the healthy group (518; 0.6%). We know there's a path from obesity to diabetes. I think it would be interesting to see if there's a path from cannabis to obesity.
- klipt 1y ago> a path from cannabis to obesity I believe the technical term is "the munchies"
- caboteria 1y agoAlso "couch lock", i.e., reduced physical activity.
- keeda 1y agoI actually would like to see a study about this. I am starting to think that the stereotype of lethargic potheads chilling on a couch comes mostly from portrayals in movies. Anecdotally, I encounter many people casually using cannabis while engaged in varying levels of physical activity, ranging from just hanging out in the city, to going on hikes, to outright partying or dancing late into the night. I even heard a couple folks use it as a "pre-workout" for long runs or lifting. I'm sure it depends on the dosage, but the relationship between usage and physical activity seems to be more nuanced than is generally understood.
- hattmall 1y agoIt's shockingly accurate. Sure people get high and do other stuff but the amount of people just sitting on couches passing weed around for hours is huge.
- zbentley 1y agoThis poses a confirmation bias issue though, no? People obviously taking marijuana and sitting around: something you look for because of the stereotype/expectation, and relatively obvious if you’re around them. People doing activities not stereotypically associated with marijuana: less obvious. Unless they are publicly consuming it (which I suspect is a bit rarer due to restrictions on and stigma about consumption in public), how would you count people who aren’t engaging in expected stoner behavior? I don’t have a dog in this fight or suspected conclusion. Just seems like it might be harder than you think to truthfully assert “everyone knows most people who take pot just sit around”.
- deleted 1y ago[deleted]
- hereme888 1y agoThe munchies....
- klysm 1y agoYou can’t claim that with effect sizes this small
- ferfumarma 1y agoThe effect size is from 0.6 to 2.2 percent. That's 4x. That seems quite large to me.
- deleted 1y ago[deleted]
- yellowapple 1y ago1% ABV is 10× as much as 0.1% ABV, but neither are gonna get you drunk particularly quick.
- klysm 1y agoEffect size needs to be relativized by the error present from the study. There’s a probability distribution over multiplicative increases which probably has a decent amount of mass below 4x
- onemoresoop 1y agoI wonder if this is connected to the appetite the cannabis consumption brings about. I personally experienced appetite from consuming it but learned that not acting on it is equally pleasant. Maybe I have more self control or something...
- Havoc 1y agoEverything fun is always bad :(
- gyomu 1y agoPlenty of bad things that are no fun (microplastics, air pollution, pesticides in food, ...) that are near impossible to escape, so don't deprive yourself of the fun stuff (with moderation).
- yowlingcat 1y agoThis is not a great "study" if you can call it that. Let me be specific by pointing a passage that's doing a lot of the heavy lifting: ``` After controlling HDL and LDL cholesterol, uncontrolled high blood pressure, atherosclerotic cardiovascular disease, cocaine use, alcohol use and several other lifestyle risk factors, the researchers found that new cases of diabetes were significantly higher in the cannabis group (1,937; 2.2%) compared to the healthy group (518; 0.6%), with statistical analysis showing cannabis users at nearly four times the risk of developing diabetes compared to non-users. ``` Note "nearly four times the risk of developing diabetes" -- this feels like a dangerous exaggeration of "four times the correlation of having developed diabetes." No controls for diet, exercise, etc. In comparison to a gold standard clinical trial this is about as far as you can go on the other end. That's not to say that I think that a prospective link doesn't merit deeper research -- far from it. In fact, Novo Nordisk has an anti-obesity drug in phase 2a trials, monlunabant [1], that serves as a CB1 (cannabinoid receptor 1) inverse agonist which has a mechanism of action inverse to THC. The clinical trials are showing that it creates modest weight loss, so it seems that there's likely something to how that receptor is activated that could cause weight gain. What's not clear to me is whether all the other receptors that THC activates create a compound effect at a population health level that leads to net weight gain and the development of diabetes, the inverse, or non-correlated outcomes, and whether those occur across the board or differentially based on genetic makeup. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Monlunabant https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Monlunabant
- lr4444lr 1y agoI occasionally use CBN for sleep, never THC, so maybe it's different, but I quickly develop a tolerance, like within a week of daily use and have to cease for many days or a few weeks to get any further benefit at all. As I read, the endocannabinoid system in the brain is pretty homeostasic. Does something similar happen with cannabis munchies subsiding to people who ingest THC or whole leaf products daily?
- giraffe_lady 1y agoAnecdotally yes. I'm a very occasional user now and get insane munchies but when I was using it differently I felt that tolerance built quickly and I stopped having munchies once it did. Not even quite daily use either like 3-4/week. Another comment elsewhere in here describes the same experience.
- jaco6 1y agoOnce you become a heavy user it no longer reliably triggers appetite, maybe because you get better at recognizing the hunger is fake and focus on other aspects of the high.
- morkalork 1y agoI've been taking CBD daily in the evening for sleep (can't find a quality source if CBN where I live - I am interned tho, the research is compelling for sleep) and I find it can act almost like an appetite suppressant.
- lr4444lr 1y agoI took CBD twice and both times it worsened my sleep, so I really wanted a pure CBN product. Not sure where you live, but this is what I use for CBN: https://www.charlottesweb.com/products/stay-asleep-cbn-gummies https://www.charlottesweb.com/products/stay-asleep-cbn-gummi... One gummy (10mg) works for about 2-3 nights, then I get another 2-3 nights effect with 20mg. Then I have to cease taking it for several days.
- morkalork 1y ago
- lvl155 1y agoAnything in excess is bad for you. Even water.
- speedgoose 1y agoSmall quantities of alcohol of cannabis are worse than water and oxygen though.
- Pooge 1y agoAlcohol (and tobacco) is bad for you even after one sip, though. Not sure you can have a vegetables or fruits overdose or even be addicted to them, but you cannot have too much of those. And to drown yourself by drinking water, you would need to drink around 7 liters in a day. You will start to feel really bad a few liters before that.
- TP740 1y agoDepending on the fruit, sugar content can also lead to diabetes, and the sugars and acids are also generally bad for dental health. Generally speaking we accept those for the other benefits of vitamins / fibre intake, et cetera. This study is quite weak, and if the upside in some cases is improved mental health, and the risks of diabetes can be mitigated with exercise, then perhaps we need to view cannabis the same way.
- Pooge 1y agoSure but the fibers and high sucrose would make you satisfied before you have any risk of becoming obese.
- cies 1y agoPeople in the dispensary look better (slimmer) than in the wallmart.
- pama 1y agoIs there a link somewhere to the actual scientific contribution? (Or at leadt an abstract?)
- sweatypants 1y agowithout reading this study in depth my immediate thoughts are: - cannabis is not the direct link with diabetes - cannabis urges munchies > overeating - overeating causes obesity - obesity causes diabetes
- deleted 1y ago[deleted]
- fijiaarone 1y agoMunchies joke?
- afw333 1y agoFrom my experience regular stoners eat less and less. Yes at first the munchies might cause issues but quickly with the developed tolerance it gets so intense that these people will barely eat without having consumed which usually causes them to loose weight. Also someone at age 18 already being a regular stoner to age 25 being a regular stoner is vastly different.
- apwell23 1y agooccasional use makes me gain weight like crazy.
- khelavastr 1y agoThis doesn't make sense as causation. Cannabis stimulates insulin-sensitizing hormone. It makes sense for the same reason that prediabetic people feel better with cannabis
- enigma101 1y agothe munchies
- jrapdx3 1y agoAfter reading the article and the comments on this page, I also think it's unclear what exclusion criteria were used to select the cannabis using and control cohorts. Controlling for likely and unlikely confounding variables is essential in this kind of study. Obesity is a notoriously heterogenous condition with a great number of inheritable and environmental contributors which makes the task especially difficult. However, a connection of particular interest concerns ADHD, a disorder identified as having a strong link to obesity, including common genetic predisposition [0]. Furthermore, individuals with ADHD are also more likely than non-ADHD peers to develop drug dependence, including cannabis-use disorder [1,2]. If ADHD was not among direct or indirect exclusion criteria, the results of the recent study could be misleading or at least incompletely characterized. [0] https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC6097237/ [1] https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC5568505/ [2] https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC8025199/
- bb88 1y agoI think the issue I have is simpler. My understanding is those that were obese and have lost weight still have a higher chance of getting type 2 diabetes than those that were slim throughout their lives. If your chance of getting diabetes is 70% while obese, and 2.2% (or 15% or whatever it actually is) after losing weight, how is that not a win?
- jrapdx3 1y agoIt is indeed a win. It's long been established that for obese individuals even 5% weight loss reduces comorbidity of obesity-related conditions. Of course greater weight loss, 10-15%, gives better outcomes. Typically the difficulty is maintaining lower weight for the long haul. For those who can do it the payoff is substantial.
- duffpkg 1y agoThis is a sketchy article about a study which is not even named because it has not yet been presented. It will be presented in the next week. I would take this entire thing with a grain of salt.
- yellowapple 1y agoThe website also has a bunch of other sketchy articles playing up the alleged “dangers” of cannabis, usually by the classic approach of conflating correlation with causation. I'll refrain from suggesting this to be deliberate on the authors' part, but there's obviously some bias at play here.
- KingOfCoders 1y ago"While the authors note that more research is needed to fully explain the association between cannabis and diabetes, it may come down to insulin resistance and unhealthy dietary behaviors." Too much chocolate I'd guess.
- deleted 1y ago[deleted]
- hannob 1y agoThis does not appear to be particularly surprising (?). I think it is widely recognized that exercise and an active lifestyle can lower the risk of type 2 diabetes. Remembering my cannabis consumption days, being under the influence of cannabis is not exactly a state that encourages an "active lifestyle".
- bubblyworld 1y agoDepends on your circles. Marijuana use is super prevalent amongst climbers (even while climbing, for better or worse) and it's a very active lifestyle. Same for surfers in my area. I don't think it's a given that people who smoke are less active.
- diordiderot 1y agoJui Jitsu also has a reputation for being a smoker friendly activity
- cykros 1y agoI believe this. I also believe that it's an indirect cause. Curious how many people who use both cannabis AND amphetamines develop type 2 diabetes. I suspect it's a smaller number. Cannabis causes obesity in some, due to its impact on appetite. Do we need to draw out links to everything that we already know obesity causes and act like this is somehow interesting information?
- 64718283661 1y agoIn my experience regular cannabis use drastically reduces appetite and weight to the point it's like a weight loss drug. I've met others who have the same experience.
- hulitu 1y ago> Cannabis use associated with quadrupled risk of developing type 2 diabetes Sugar has nothing to do with diabetes. Regards, Nestle. /s
- quickthrowman 1y agoIf anything, I’d wager that a lack of impulse control in some folks leads them to eat junk food and consume THC. Correlation, not causation. There are a number of impulse control disorders that I feel are all related, in the sense that if you’ve got a lack of impulse control you’re more likely to overeat, consume drugs and alcohol, get addicted to video games, gamble, have risky sex, etc. I have gone down a few of these paths personally due to to my own problems with impulse control and have seen similar patterns in others.