Cannabis use increases risk of dying from heart attacks and strokes, large study found
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Using marijuana doubles the risk of heart disease death, according to a new analysis of consolidated medical data involving 200 million people aged 19 to 59.
“It is particularly surprising that the patients hospitalized for these diseases are young (and therefore unlikely to have their clinical characteristics due to smoking) and have no history of cardiovascular disease or cardiovascular risk factors,” said senior author Émilie Jouanjusemilie Jouanjus.,,,,, Associate Professor of Pharmacology at the University of Toulouse, France, was in an email.
People who use marijuana also have a 29% increase in heart attack risk and a 20% increase in stroke risk compared to non-users.
“This is one of the largest studies of the link between marijuana and heart disease to date, and raises serious questions about the assumption that marijuana has little cardiovascular risk,” said pediatrician Dr. Lynn Silver.
Senior Consultant to the Nonprofit Public Health Organization, a nonprofit public health organization that analyzes marijuana policy and legalizes, is also a senior consultant to the Institute of Public Health.
Silver is a co-author of an editorial published with this article, which calls for a change in the way health professionals, regulators and the public as a whole sees marijuana.
“Clinicians need to screen people’s marijuana use and educate us about the harms of tobacco because in some populations it is used more widely than tobacco,” she said. “Our regulatory regime is almost entirely focused on creating legal infrastructure and licensing legal, for-profit (cannabis) businesses, and needs to be more focused on health warnings that educate people about real risks.”
Experts say that when potential health hazards are involved, marijuana is increasingly effective today. – Juanma Hache/Moment RF/Getty Images
Danger of smoke (maybe food)
New systematic reviews and meta-analysis analyze medical information from large observational studies conducted in Australia, Egypt, Canada, France, Sweden and the United States between 2016 and 2023.
These studies did not ask people how to use marijuana, such as by smoking, evaporation, wiping, eating, tin agents or topical use. (Waving involves evaporating cannabis and inhaling vapor.) However, “based on epidemiological data, it is likely to smoke in the vast majority of cases,” Jouanjus said.
Tobacco is a well-known cause of heart disease – According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, smoke and chemicals in tobacco can damage blood vessels and increase blood clotting.
So, it’s no surprise that smoking, smoke or weakening cannabis can do the same thing, Silver said: “Either of the many ways to inhale marijuana will risk users and there is also a risk of second-hand smoke similar to tobacco.”
Dr. Beth Cohen, a professor of medicine at the University of California, San Francisco, told CNN in a previous interview that smoking marijuana is less harmful because it is “natural” and that it is wrong.
“When you burn something, whether it’s tobacco or marijuana, it produces harmful compounds, carcinogens and particles that are harmful to health,” Cohen said in an email.
However, according to a May 2025 study, food may also play a role in heart disease.
People who consumed tetrahydrocannabinol (THC) showed signs of early cardiovascular disease similar to those of smokers.
Leila Mohammamadi, PhD, assistant researcher at the University of California, San Francisco, told CNN in a previous interview.
Dangers of high-efficiency weeds
None of the new meta-analysis asked about the efficacy of THC in products consumed by users. Silver said that even with this information, it will soon be outdated.
“The marijuana market is a moving target. Every day is getting stronger.”
“What is sold to people today in California is 510 times stronger than the 1970s. The concentrate can be 99% pure thirty-six content. Vapes vapes are over 80%.
“Cannabinoids extracted from various chemicals can be almost pure THC, and all of these have a very different effect on people than smoking in the 1970s.”
Higher potency weeds are causing many problems, including increased addiction – a July 2022 study found that studies consuming high weeds increased with increased dependence risk by fourfold.
According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), one in 10 people who use marijuana in the United States suffer from marijuana use disorder, a medical term for marijuana addiction.
“We know that stronger marijuana makes people more likely to become addicted,” Silver said. “We know that stronger marijuana makes people more likely to develop psychosis, see and hear things that don’t exist or schizophrenia. The habitual user may also suffer from uncontrollable vomiting.”
The increase in efficacy is one of the reasons the current study may not capture the full range of risk of cannabis with heart disease, Jongis said: “We are concerned that the association may be more powerful than reported.”
While science continues to study this risk, experts say it’s time to think twice before doing it, especially when heart disease is a problem.
“If I were a 60-year-old at risk of heart disease, I would be very cautious about using marijuana,” Silver said. “I have seen older people using marijuana for pain or sleep, some of whom have severe cardiovascular risks, people with stroke or heart attack or heart disease, and they are not aware that this could put them at greater risk.”
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