U.S. study links marijuana use to more sex

Where there is smoke, theretends to be fire, say medical researchers who conducted research indicating frequentmarijuana users have about 20 per cent more sex than those who don't smoke pot.

Stanford University School of Medicine researchers unveiledthe link between marijuana and the frequency of sexualintercourse in a study publishedFriday in the Journal ofSexual Medicine.

Researchers in California reached their conclusions after aretrospective analysis of data on 50,000 Americans ages 25 to45, compiled from 2002 to 2015 by the National Survey of FamilyGrowth. The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Preventionsponsors the survey.

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Respondents were asked how many times they have hadheterosexual intercourse in the previousfour weeks and howfrequently they have smoked marijuana overthe past 12 months,Stanford researchers said in a news release.

Women who were daily pot users had sex an average of 7.1times during the previous four weeks, compared with sixtimesreported by those who denied using marijuana in the past year.For men, daily users reported 6.9 times compared with 5.6 fornon-users.

"In other words, pot users are having about 20 per cent moresex than pot abstainers," said the study's senior author, Dr.Michael Eisenberg, assistant professor of urology at Stanford.

Given that the average couple has sex about once a week,Eisenberg said, the bottom line for partaking in a bong or bluntcould add up to 20 more instances of sexual intercourse eachyear.

"I think if you asked a man or a woman, 20 more times tohave sex over a year, that would seem like a lot," Eisenbergsaid.

It used to be thought that couples mostly smoked after sex,but Eisenberg said his findings show the opposite is true for"all races, ages, education levels, income groups and religions,every health status, whether they were married or single andwhether or not they had kids."

Marijuana is legal for medical or recreational adult use in29 states and the District of Columbia, said spokesman MorganFox of the Marijuana Policy Project.

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A record percentage of Americans 64 per cent now believeadult use of the drug should be legal, according to a Galluppoll published this week. Ottawa plans to legalize marijuana across Canada in 2018.

Eisenberg cautioned the study should not be misinterpretedas having proven a causal link.

"It doesn't say if you smoke more marijuana, you'll havemore sex," he said.

Still, for many, research in the name of science may neverbe so fun.