Is Cannabis Riskier than Alcohol

While the World Health Organization's claim – echoed by some antialcohol zealots – that one drink of alcohol will give you cancer, everyone who's studied the issue acknowledges that drastic overconsumption, the sort of thing that leads to what mental health people now call "alcohol use disorder," formerly known as "alcoholism."

But what about cannabis? How much cannabis is too much?

That topic has been examined recently by both The Washington Post and The Wall Street Journal.

Here there's pretty much agreement: doctors and researchers say marijuana can pose real risks to peoples' health, mainly additiction and mental health problems, notably anxiety. What's not known is how much is too much.

A major reason for that is that it has been little studied, partly because until recently it was illegal and there was a stigma attached to its use.

Cannabis has become a major competitor to alcohol. So bev/al execs should know just how dangerous it is. And, as far as I'm concerned, suppliers should be publicizing the dangers. According to the National Institutes of Health, marijuana advocates frequently publicize health and societal risks of alcohol to argue that cannabis is a safer alternative. So, turn about is fair play.

The WSJ quotes Dr. Jonathan Avery, vice chair for addiction psychiatry at Weill Cornell Medicine, as saying he's seeing more people coming into the emergency room worried they are dying after overdosing on high-potency THC products.

The drug is particularly dangerous for kids, he says, with even low levels being linked to an increased risk of developing psychiatric disorders and doing poorly in school. One study found people who started using cannabis as teenagers lost several IQ points between 13 and 18.

Frequent long-term cannabis use has been associated with cannabis hyperemesis syndrome, a condition that causes cycles of nausea and vomiting, sometimes accompanied by severe stomach paid.

Among daily marijuana users, two to three times as many people will develop cannabis use disorder compared to alcohol (20%-30% vs. 10%).

Daily cannabis use was associated with a greater risk of heart disease and stroke, according to a 2024 study in the Journal of the American Heart Association. One doctor quoted by the Washington Post noted that cannabis smoke contains many of the same unhealthy combustion products that harm a person's arteries.