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E-Cigarettes Emit Toxic Vapors, Says Study (upi.com)
An anonymous reader quotes a report from UPI: All electronic cigarettes emit harmful chemicals, and levels of those toxic compounds are affected by factors such as temperature, type and age of the device, a new study finds. In laboratory tests, scientists found that the heat-related breakdown of propylene glycol and glycerin -- two solvents found in most e-cigarette liquids -- causes emissions of toxic chemicals such as acrolein, acetaldehyde and formaldehyde. All three are either respiratory irritants or carcinogens, the investigators said. The researchers also found that levels of harmful chemicals in e-cigarette vapor increase between the first few puffs and later puffs as the device gets hotter, and with each use of the device.The new study was published July 27 in the journal Environmental Science and Technology. "Advocates of e-cigarettes say emissions are much lower than from conventional cigarettes, so you're better off using e-cigarettes," study corresponding author Hugo Destaillats said in a Berkeley news release. "I would say, that may be true for certain users -- for example, long-time smokers that cannot quit -- but the problem is, it doesn't mean that they're healthier. Regular cigarettes are super unhealthy. E-cigarettes are just unhealthy," he explained. The FDA will start regulating e-cigarettes like tobacco on August 8, 2016.
This is a device that was designed to emit toxic vapours.
Nicotine may be a toxin, but in the amounts in which it's consumed, that's the least concern about the effects upon the body. However, these devices weren't intended to emit other toxic vapors.
It's like saying that fireplaces pose a fire hazard or that an electric outlet carries the risk of electrocution. It's what it's supposed to do.
False. A fire hazard is an uncontrolled fire. A fireplace is designed to control a fire. An electric outlet is not designed to electrocute you. It's designed to deliver power to an appliance. Granted, some of them are not very well designed to explicitly not electrocute you, but that's a separate issue.
The idea of the vaporizer is to deliver as clean a smoking experience as possible. If you put water-based herbal extracts into them, that's what you're doing. What's interesting is that these other things aren't that clean, either. Anyone remember transparent cigarette papers? They were everywhere for a while, I went through a couple of packs myself on the basis that I was already smoking tobacco so who cares, but what was found is that only the center of the cherry is hot enough to burn the combustion byproducts into something harmless, which meant that you were getting a bunch of toxics from them even worse than smoking paper.
"You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
Advocates of e-cigarettes say emissions are much lower than from conventional cigarettes, so you're better off using e-cigarettes. I would say, that may be true for certain users -- for example, long-time smokers that cannot quit -- but the problem is, it doesn't mean that they're healthier. Regular cigarettes are super unhealthy. E-cigarettes are just unhealthy.
Dude, if they're less unhealthy, that means that they're healthier. You just contradicted yourself.
Well, I guess he's from Berkeley, so they wouldn't have released it if it didn't involve at least some doublethink.
I too think e-cigarettes are an annoying and asinine way for people to keep doing something they know they shouldn't. And who knows what further problems we may eventually figure out they may cause. But that doesn't mean we get to lie about them. It makes it really hard to get behind a movement when its participants are spewing propaganda along with their actual science.