contact highs
Study warns of transferring THC through breastfeeding
It’s common knowledge you shouldn’t drink alcohol or smoke cigarettes when you’re nursing. But apparently some new moms haven’t figured out yet that it’s probably not cool to smoke weed when breastfeeding.
A top medical journal yesterday found THC, the main mind-altering ingredient in pot that gets people “high,” was found in the breast milk of nursing mothers up to six days after they had used it.
Fifty breastfeeding women using pot — amazingly, these women were smoking almost daily while nursing — gave samples of their breast milk to researchers at the University of California San Diego School of Medicine from 2014 to 2107. Small amounts of THC were found in 34 of 54 samples up to six days after the mother had used pot, according to the new study by Pediatrics, a journal by the American Academy of Pediatrics.
In a video on the journal’s website, Dr. Christina Chambers said they did the study because they expect pot use among pregnant women and nursing mothers to increase as more states legalize marijuana for recreational use.
Currently, she said, the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists and the American Academy of Pediatrics say breastfeeding women shouldn’t use marijuana, but acknowledged there is a “lack of available concrete data” that it can cause harm to babies.
Here in Massachusetts, pot use is legal medically and recreationally, and one of the state’s top pro-pot voices says the study’s findings should be heeded.
“This study echoes previous studies that show that cannabis or any other psychoactive substance can transfer to breast milk and using those substances should be avoided by mothers while they’re breastfeeding,” said Jim Borghesani, who helped lead the Bay State’s legalization campaign and now works as a consultant for the cannabis industry.
“Nobody in the cannabis movement that I’ve seen has ever said that it’s completely safe across the board. It’s clearly a psychoactive substance and people should be aware of that, particularly women who are either pregnant or breastfeeding,” Borghesani said.
Sherry Spacco, a lactation consultant and chairwoman of the Massachusetts Breastfeeding Coalition, said more studies on the effects of marijuana on a baby’s development needs to be done — and mothers need to be informed.
“Alcohol is legal and it’s not safe to drink while you’re pregnant and breastfeeding a baby,” Spacco said. “So the legal part of it has nothing to do with what actually happens when you take it. That’s what mothers need to be clear on.”
“You can drink alcohol legally in this country but when you’re pregnant or breastfeeding we tell you not to do that. Same thing as marijuana,” she added. “It might be legal in this country to do it whether medicinally or whether it be recreationally but we don’t recommend you do it while you’re pregnant and nursing a baby.”
But does anyone really not know that?