Slashdot Mirror
E-cigarettes 'Potentially As Harmful As Tobacco Cigarettes' (uconn.edu)
An anonymous reader shares a report: A study by chemists at the University of Connecticut offers new evidence that electronic cigarettes, or e-cigarettes, are potentially as harmful as tobacco cigarettes. Using a new low-cost, 3-D printed testing device, UConn researchers found that e-cigarettes loaded with a nicotine-based liquid are potentially as harmful as unfiltered cigarettes when it comes to causing DNA damage. The researchers also found that vapor from non-nicotine e-cigarettes caused as much DNA damage as filtered cigarettes, possibly due to the many chemical additives present in e-cigarette vapors. Cellular mutations caused by DNA damage can lead to cancer.
While nicotine is a dangerous chemical poison (and useful insecticide) I was always under the impression it was other chemicals in cigarettes that were even more harmful.
Website Just Down For Me? Find out
I'm pretty sure you're only half right.
1) Nicotine is problematic, it interferes with the body's ability to fight cancer, but it doesn't look like it causes it
2) There is no "burnt" or whatever we want to call it, "burnt" appears to be a carcinogen in general (for example, diets heavy in blackened and charred food seem to lead to GI cancers)
3) Vaping seems to be better for the cardiovascular system than smoking.
But, I do suspect it is not harmless, and may even be quite bad. For one thing, inhaling solvents, even food safe ones, is likely not the healthiest thing, also, It wouldn't shock me to learn that breathing 400 degree air carries with it it's own health effects.
It still seems to be much healthier than smoking.
Wow, sent an e-mail as suggested when clicking on "use classic" banner, and got a fast response that addressed my msg
'E-cigarrettes' are just a blatant drug delivery device (for nicotine, a highly addictive and poisonous substance), plain and simple, and that was blindingly obvious the first time I ever heard about them.
Tell that to the people I know who went from smoking 1-2 packs a day of cigarettes, to e-cigs/vaping, and now don't even smoke at all.
The only thing necessary for evil to triumph is for it to be pitted against a slightly greater evil
Nicotine is the most dangerous part of a traditional cigarette, per mg. However, much like with coffee and caffeine, nicotine is a very small portion of the traditional delivery method. At the volumes in a normal cigarette, the burnt paper smoke is enough of a lung cancer risk even if it was completely emptied of tobacco products and additives.
At different times, cigarettes have had different additives with different levels of inhaled toxicity, but the smoke always consists primarily of burnt plant materials, filling the smokers' lungs with carcinogenic ash and some small amount of very addictive, fairly toxic nicotine.
They never seem to promote the stories that are in direct contradiction to this study. The Royal College of Physicians in the U.K. made a determination the e-cigarettes were at least 95% less harmful than cigarettes. No one cared. But every time this type of study, typically with terrible methodology no one pays attention to, is released, the media goes nuts. Saying something is safe isn't click bait worthy.
The study was only looking at cancer risks so drawing conclusions that vaping is just as bad as smoking from this article is ill informed. As you allude to there are other respiratory illnesses, like COPD, where the tar from smoking is a major factor. If vaping has equivalent odds of causing cancer as smoking but reduces risk of other illnesses it seems rather obvious that we should encourage people to move from smoking to vaping in order to reduce the amount of respiratory illness. Getting them off smoking/vaping entirely would be the best but addictions are what they are.
"Lack of speed can be overcome. In the worst case by patience." --Znork
First of all banning is not a solution.
That depends on your goals. If you primary goal is to put a lot of poor people and minorities behind bars for using drugs that seldom result in meaningful harm to others then banning is a terrific solution. Not so much for people with a sense of decency and any amount of practicality though.
Most legitimate peer-reviewed journals have a conflict of interest disclosure requirement, so you just have to look at the paper to see.
The paper isn't available to no-subcribers, but here's the guideline listed by the journal in question:
A statement describing any financial conflicts of interest or lack thereof is published with each manuscript. During the submission process, the corresponding author must provide this statement on behalf of all authors of the manuscript. The statement should describe all potential sources of bias, including affiliations, funding sources, and financial or management relationships, that may constitute conflicts of interest (please see the ACS Ethical Guidelines). The statement will be published in the final article. If no conflict of interest is declared, the following statement will be published in the article: “The authors declare no competing financial interest.”
The bigger question is, what is the nature of the paper, and the journal it appears in?
The gold standard for evidence is a literature review paper published in a relevant journal that has a high impact factor for its field. Even high quality research reported in a relevant legitimate journal isn't something anyone should make any judgments based on. Science deals with evidence, and evidence in any non-trivial question tends to pile up on both sides at the outset.
ACS Sensors is a relatively new journal published by the American Chemical Society for research in chemical sensor technology. It's not even a health-related journal. This doesn't mean the research is bad, or the conclusions are bad. It just means that they're mainly relevant as to whether this technology could be used to research the health impact of e-cigarettes.
Post may contain irony: discontinue use if experiencing mood swings, nausea or elevated blood pressure.
The alternative to a nanny state is a lot more people injuring and killing themselves, and the rest of us having to pay for it in both monetary and non-monetary ways.
Sorry to sound snarky, but "citation needed". Seriously - I've been around long enough to see the "War On Drugs" play out, and billions of government dollars and millions of drug possessors in prison has done squat for addiction rates. Meanwhile, usage of the completely legal cigarettes has been drastically curtailed by simply restricting advertising, improving education. restrictions on second-hand smoke, and taxing them to the hairy edge of a black market.
W..w..W - Willy Waterloo washes Warren Wiggins who is washing Waldo Woo.
Author Contributions
The manuscript was written through contributions of all authors. All authors have given approval to the final version of the manuscript.
The authors declare no competing financial interest.
Acknowledgment
The authors thank the National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences (NIEHS), NIH, Grant No. ES03154 for financial support. We thank Islam M. Mosa for SEM images.
https://www.gov.uk/government/...