Organic & Pesticide-Free Cardio-Safe Choices

If you’re thinking about Cardio health and disease, check the data and research below and you’ll see why it makes sense to choose to smoke or vape only organic or pesticide-free Tobacco and Cannabis. Conventionally-grown Tobacco and Cannabis are heavily contaminated with multiple classes of pesticides, and are the only two ways that people are exposed daily to inhaled pesticides and heavy metals. Inhaled pesticides and heavy metals have serious cardio consequences, and millions of people who regularly smoke and vape non-organic Cannabis and Tobacco are subjected to these consequences.

“Pesticide exposure and risk of cardiovascular disease: A systematic review“

https://doi.org/10.1080/17441692.2020.1808693

“The results show the occupational exposure to pesticides chlorpyrifos, coumafos, carbofuran, ethylene bromide, mancozeb, ziram, metalaxyl, pendimethalin and trifluralin was associated a risk of 1.8 to 3.2 for acute myocardial infarction.

Primaphos, fenitrothion, malathion and deltamethrin pesticides were associated with a blood pressure increase.

Environmental contamination by tetrachlorodibenzo-p-dioxin was associated with CVD with risk of 1.09 to 2.78 and organochlorine, 1.19 to 4.54; heavy metals, arsenic, trimethylarsine and dimethylarsinic acid with atherosclerosis and systemic arterial hypertension.

These findings point to the association between exposure to pesticides and CVD, signaling the importance of greater rigor in the public policy related to pesticides.”

Inhaled pesticides go straight to the brain, nerves, glands and organs without the liver detox that occurs when pesticides are swallowed in food or liquid. The list of known chronic diseases caused by inhaled pesticides is long and includes diabetes, Alzheimer’s, and obesity, but here we’ll stick to briefly reviewing the Cardio consequences of inhaling pesticides.

While states set limits on allowable pesticide residues and on a few heavy metals on Cannabis, the pesticide limits are not based on science but on pure speculation. Pesticide residue limits on Cannabis are based almost exclusively on USDA pesticide residue exposure limits permitted for exposure of tobacco workers in the field, and on EPA testing that only looks at outcomes like acute single dosages that kill lab animals. There is no testing at all for the health effects of daily low-dose exposure to any of the literally dozens of pesticides being inhaled from Cannabis and Tobacco.

Nobody has a clue what health effects of chronic pesticide inhalation are, because none of the pesticides being inhaled by people smoking or vaping Cannabis have ever once been tested for their health effects through chronic inhalation, alone or in combination. The bottom line is that state-level Cannabis pesticide regulations are a sham – and there are almost certainly no safe levels of many of the most commonly inhaled pesticides (see the data below).

Comparison of State-Level Regulations for Cannabis Contaminants and Implications for Public Health

https://ehp.niehs.nih.gov/doi/full/10.1289/EHP11206

So please check the science and ask yourself – why not avoid inhaling pesticides and heavy metals when you really do have a choice of organic leaf and flower? There are no cardio-safe pesticides or heavy metals when exposure comes from chronic inhalation, whether you’re smoking or vaping.

The only way that organic or truly pesticide-free choices will become the standard will be for those of us who enjoy smoking and vaping to vote with our money and buy only organic or pesticide-free flower or leaf.

Fortunately that choice exists in both Tobacco and Cannabis. In most places now you can safely grow your own Cannabis, and trustworthy growers aren’t that hard to find, while organic tobacco leaf is easily available for RYO and American Spirit makes several organic brands.

Here’s a taste of the published science and hard data. You can find plenty more published science with simple PubMed searches.

“Analyzing pesticides and metal(loid)s in imported tobacco to Saudi Arabia and risk assessment of inhalation exposure to certain metals“

https://doi.org/10.1080/08958378.2022.2037791

“Contaminant Metals as Cardiovascular Risk Factors: A Scientific Statement From the American Heart Association“

https://www.ahajournals.org/doi/10.1161/JAHA.123.029852

“Contaminant metals interfere with critical intracellular reactions and functions leading to oxidative stress and chronic inflammation that result in endothelial dysfunction, hypertension, epigenetic dysregulation, dyslipidemia, and changes in myocardial excitation and contractile function. Lead, cadmium, and arsenic have been linked to subclinical atherosclerosis, coronary artery stenosis, and calcification as well as to increased risk of ischemic heart disease and stroke, left ventricular hypertrophy and heart failure, and peripheral artery disease. Epidemiological studies show that exposure to lead, cadmium, or arsenic is associated with cardiovascular death mostly attributable to ischemic heart disease.“