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A person has died from a vaping-related condition

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Re: A person has died from a vaping-related condition

#41
post #31

I'm guessing that if this really is associated with vaping then it's likely due to the limited regulation of the ingredients. Bad batch of VG/PG/nicotine? Some problematic flavouring? I think the best article I've found is at the BMJ: https://www.bmj.com/content/366/bmj.l5228 - sorry, paywall. Very much inconslusive at the moment completely in the public health triage stage. Good idea to regulate it properly. I just…

Similar story here. Smoked for ten years. Actually found it easy to replace smoking with vaping (strong menthol). Stopped vaping after 1 year because I was suffering from GERD and suspected that vaping was an attributing factor. Since I stopped 5 years ago, my GERD symptoms have more or less disappeared. I really enjoyed vaping, probably more than smoking, but somehow it did not seem to have the same addictive effect…

I stuck with it for 5 years because I was paranoid about relapse to cigarettes. Spent a couple of weeks in countries where vaping is illegal as a dry run, earlier this year, and then just waited for the juice to run out.

The addictive effect of nicotine seems much enhanced by the addition of a monoamine oxidase compound (ie related to the early antidepressant drugs) - which is present in burning tobacco - which seems to take nicotine from approximately as addictive as caffeine to more addictive than heroin (citation available).

Re: A person has died from a vaping-related condition

#42
post #35

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Another vector of harm to consider — Keep in mind that “vapor” is used to disguise that, in all cases whether nicotine or pot or etc, people are heating up a substance to its smoke point and inhaling that smoke. They use “vapor” because it sounds like “water vapor” - which is harmless - but it’s definitely not that. Marijuana cartridges use marijuana oil or MCT oil as a base, for example. Nicotine uses glycol or othe…

> Keep in mind that “vapor” is used to disguise that, in all cases whether nicotine or pot or etc, people are heating up a substance to its smoke point and inhaling that smoke. They use “vapor” because it sounds like “water vapor” - which is harmless - but it’s definitely not that. This is not true. It's producing an aerosol, partially by condensation of vapor produced by heating the glycerine and propylene glycol mi…

There are also “coils” that vibrate to create vapour which happens at room temperature.

Re: A person has died from a vaping-related condition

#43
post #31

I'm guessing that if this really is associated with vaping then it's likely due to the limited regulation of the ingredients. Bad batch of VG/PG/nicotine? Some problematic flavouring? I think the best article I've found is at the BMJ: https://www.bmj.com/content/366/bmj.l5228 - sorry, paywall. Very much inconslusive at the moment completely in the public health triage stage. Good idea to regulate it properly. I just…

Similar story here. Smoked for ten years. Actually found it easy to replace smoking with vaping (strong menthol). Stopped vaping after 1 year because I was suffering from GERD and suspected that vaping was an attributing factor. Since I stopped 5 years ago, my GERD symptoms have more or less disappeared. I really enjoyed vaping, probably more than smoking, but somehow it did not seem to have the same addictive effect…

Is it possible vaping did not suppress your appetite like smoking did, and so your stomach created more digestive acids, but you didn't eat more because of habit?

Re: A person has died from a vaping-related condition

#44
post #5

> As the mechanism is unknown, it’s unclear what the actual danger is. Is it some byproduct of the nicotine cartidges, or THC ones? Is it the vapor itself? Is it only at certain temperatures or concentrations? Is it directly affecting the lungs or entering the bloodstream? No one knows yet — all they’ve seen is an sudden uptick in respiratory or pulmonary issues where the sufferer also uses vaping products. We've see…

I also remember reading about the heat of the coils causing "nano" copper particles to be released/inhaled, might be a contributing factor.

Re: A person has died from a vaping-related condition

#45
post #44
post #5

> As the mechanism is unknown, it’s unclear what the actual danger is. Is it some byproduct of the nicotine cartidges, or THC ones? Is it the vapor itself? Is it only at certain temperatures or concentrations? Is it directly affecting the lungs or entering the bloodstream? No one knows yet — all they’ve seen is an sudden uptick in respiratory or pulmonary issues where the sufferer also uses vaping products. We've see…

I also remember reading about the heat of the coils causing "nano" copper particles to be released/inhaled, might be a contributing factor.

Coils aren’t made of copper afaik, they are made out of steel or any other metal with high resistance.

Re: A person has died from a vaping-related condition

#46
post #5

> As the mechanism is unknown, it’s unclear what the actual danger is. Is it some byproduct of the nicotine cartidges, or THC ones? Is it the vapor itself? Is it only at certain temperatures or concentrations? Is it directly affecting the lungs or entering the bloodstream? No one knows yet — all they’ve seen is an sudden uptick in respiratory or pulmonary issues where the sufferer also uses vaping products. We've see…

I vape - I buy only high quality liquids from a reputable manufacturer who extensively test all of their recipes. I find my lung function is 100x better than when I smoked.

I did, however, once buy a THC liquid, from a “reputable” dark web dealer. It was bloody awful - found myself retching and hacking for days after a few small tokes, and it destroyed both the coil and the tank - sticky residue, carbon, bleurgh.

So... given that the other symptoms mentioned are vomiting and diarrhoea, I think this is going to transpire to be dodgy THC liquids, as this also sounds like Cannabis Hyperemesis Syndrome.

Re: A person has died from a vaping-related condition

#47

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It certainly seems like the vape industry set back social progress on this front significantly. Cigarettes stopped being cool quite a while ago, and smoking is almost never allowed indoors anymore, but hey, look these e-cigarettes are safe and trendy and all the cool kids are doing them.

Social progress is prohibition or freedom of choice? What's the harm?

I think the harm is probably in the re-normalisation of nicotine addiction.

I smoked for a long time, and went on a vape recently, but the ads everywhere (in Ireland/UK) for various vaping services and devices are pretty concerning.

For me, it's harm reduction, but if non-smokers start vaping, that's a net loss.

Re: A person has died from a vaping-related condition

#48

So I've been saying something like this for years now. HOW do we know something is not going wrong without any long term/clinical data (ESPECIALLY around these custom flavours that people sometimes roll out themselves)? I think it's completely presumptuous when people tout vaping as being much safer than cigarettes. We didn't all wake up one day knowing smoking was bad - it was a long road filled with politics, scien…

Honestly, I think switching from something which WILL kill you to something which might have as-yet-undiscovered long term health implications is an absolute win.

Re: A person has died from a vaping-related condition

#49
Worth noting that the author makes a significant claim without any citation:

> That vaping works as a way to quit smoking... seems clear.

Studies have been fairly limited so far, given the recency of e-cigarettes (relative to science's timescale). And the studies that we have seem pretty mixed: some showing benefit over other accepted smoking cessation methods, some not. Some showing higher relapse rates in the e-cigarette group. Nothing about that seems clear to me.

Re: A person has died from a vaping-related condition

#50
post #36

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Radium. Cigarettes. Asbestos. We've seen it plenty of times when a product comes out and people with an agenda to make money off it say "buy this, it works" and then decades later it is discovered to have been toxic or harmful in some way. Especially given the nature of this product, skepticism should be the default position.

Remember when the news constantly threw out countless articles about cell phones causing brain cancer? Remember, fear sells ads, so we should also be very skeptical of articles like these.

Because skepticism turns out to sometimes be unwarranted we should be skeptical of skepticism?

You can't have it both ways.

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