Title: Marijuana Slims? Why Pot Smokers Are Less Obese | TIME.com
Headings: Marijuana Slims? Why Pot Smokers Are Less Obese
Diet
Marijuana Slims? Why Pot Smokers Are Less Obese

Content: Cheers, Ladies! A Drink a Day May Mean Good Health in Older Age
Many other factors could account for the connection. For example, some research finds that highly religious people are less likely to take drugs, but more likely to be obese — perhaps because they’re substituting one compulsive behavior (overeating) for the other (smoking marijuana). So, some of the obese people in the national surveys may be religious folk, who might otherwise be heavy marijuana smokers, but are eating too much instead. That could make it look like marijuana is slimming. Also consider that one of the most popular uses of medical marijuana is to stimulate appetite in people with cancer, AIDS or other diseases. Such patients are significantly less likely to be obese than the general population — so in this case, weight loss would precede or prompt the marijuana smoking. Whatever the explanation for the link between marijuana and less obesity, it’s unlikely that cannabis could serve as an effective diet aid. For one, smoking pot has been shown to increase appetite in multiple studies, at least in the short-term, so it likely wouldn’t help dieters resist temptation. Secondly, a drug that has the opposite effect of THC, marijuana’s main psychoactive ingredient, has itself been shown to aid dieting.