OMG You're All Gonna Die! Again!

[JoeMcPlumber]

Could someone smarter than i am please address this?

The relevant sensationalism du jour:
[URL='http://www.11alive.com/story/news/health/2014/12/26/study-e-cigarettes-damage-healthy-cells/20907631/']Study: E-cigarettes damage healthy cells[/URL]

^Just an example, but most the news says the same thing copied and pasted.

The "source" that most said cut-and-paste jobs are citing:
[URL='http://multimedianewsroom.tv/story.php?id=899&enter=0']Study Links the Liquid Used in E-cigarettes to an Increased Risk of Viral Infections[/URL]

And the study itself:
[URL='http://www.plosone.org/article/info:doi/10.1371/journal.pone.0108342']PLOS ONE: Electronic Cigarette Liquid Increases Inflammation and Virus Infection in Primary Human Airway Epithelial Cells[/URL]

Briefly, they put an electronic cigarette on one end of an e-cigarette sucking machine, and human epithelial cells on the other end. The conclusion is that e-juice damages respiratory cells and compromises immune response. I can't make heads or tails of it, too much science in.
.
.
but,

you all ARE going to die,

,and that's the best excuse i can think of to live large.

Wishing all a healthy and prosperous 2015,

Carpe Annum!

 

[AndriaD]

That's my usual reaction to crap like this.

Happy new year!!

Andria

 

[WendyM]

Funny, because PG is an antiviral and an antibacterial, it's not really surprising that it damages epithelial cells though-- since pretty much everything does to varying degrees depending on what kind and from whence they were taken.

I like to damage the epithelial cells in my mouth by putting sriracha sauce on sharp cheddar quesadillas. Then damage them some more by washing it all down with tea. Because I live dangerously, or something. Probably something.

PG and VG don't seem (anecdotally, from my own personal experience) to damage my epithelial cells as much as smoking analog cigarettes.

 

[caramel]

Briefly, they put an electronic cigarette on one end of an e-cigarette sucking machine, and human epithelial cells on the other end.

So where was the virus coming from? Was it already in the Petri dish? Or did they use contaminated liquid / air?

Also, their setup is similar to a permanent, continuous direct to lung inhale. The result would indicate something like "if you take a 10 minutes direct to lung inhale, by the end of it you will start damaging your epithelial cells". Anyone here capable of a 10 minutes long inhale? Shouldn't their setup mimic more closely the actual way we inhale (10 seconds at best)?

Also conspicuously absent is a comparative study with a classic tobacco cigarette.

 

[AndriaD]

So where was the virus coming from? Was it already in the Petri dish? Or did they use contaminated liquid / air?

Also, their setup is similar to a permanent, continuous direct to lung inhale. The result would indicate something like "if you take a 10 minutes direct to lung inhale, by the end of it you will start damaging your epithelial cells". Anyone here capable of a 10 minutes long inhale? Shouldn't their setup mimic more closely the actual way we inhale (10 seconds at best)?

Also conspicuously absent is a comparative study with a classic tobacco cigarette.

Don't confuse anything they're doing with actual science. Science sets up objective tests, and gets objective results. These folks START with the end result they want, and then setup the "test" to yield that desired result. Has nothing whatever to do with science.

Andria

 

[kenbu]

Hmmmm... if e cigs increase the risk of viral infections then why is this the second winter that I have gone without getting sick once where I usually end up getting sick at least twice a winter? The only difference between the last 2 winters and the previous 30 or so is that I do NOT smoke and instead vape?

 

[beatts]

Can anyone relink the actual study? The page can't be found anymore (suspicious). It really depends on the type of ecig used to start asking questions about the studys validity. My guess is that most of these studies used the common Blu or disposable ecigs which undoubtedly have a higher PG ratio for people looking for that burn like a cigarette. PG is the sketchiest part of liquid because it seems harmless when INGESTED in low quantities (it's used to bond gum) but also extremely dangerous (FDA recalled Fireball whiskey for dangerously high levels of PG). I wouldn't be surprised if propylene glycol had this effect when burning it as you don't really know what a synthetic is turning into in your body.

Sent from my SAMSUNG-SM-N900A using Tapatalk

 

[tmcguffie]

Even in my short life, I'm 58 by the way, I have never come across such a virulent attack on such a relatively harmless pastime. The dreaded cigarettes themselves were subjected to a very slow and gradual erosion of there acceptance over a period of, I would guess, 30 years perhaps more, given that they were known and scientifically proven to kill people in some very nasty ways. Now we have "them" coming at us (vapers) with a both barrels, guns blazing full on frontal assault, with what seems to be a total disregard for any sort scientific reasoning behind their arguments.
Is it just me, or is the entire planet going stark raving bonkers, I do fear for our survival as a species

 

[TyPie]

Agree with tmcguffie above. I, personally, am extremely interested in learning and knowing the full truth about ecig use, risks, and any potential dangers. The public argument for or against ecigs by the antzies, it seems, has become all about winning the argument instead of learning the truth. Reminds me a bit of trial lawyers, for example. To hell with the truth, it's all about winning.

For the sake of public health and, potentially millions of lives, let's get to the truths.

 

[nopatch]

Hmmmm... if e cigs increase the risk of viral infections then why is this the second winter that I have gone without getting sick once where I usually end up getting sick at least twice a winter? The only difference between the last 2 winters and the previous 30 or so is that I do NOT smoke and instead vape?

If I have to make a wild guess, I would say you (any one who is inhaling PG on a regular basis, I mean) will be more susceptible to acquire lung infection once you go PG(Or vape) free for a couple of days.Since PG, while it is present in the lungs, kills of any living organism your chances of acquiring lung infection is zero . once PG is flushed out from the lungs they are more susceptible to infection since it caused lung cell inflammation while it was present.

This guess is based on the assumption that the study is true.Also since body has a way to repair inflammation on it's own and also since it varies from person to person the lab results, like in any isolated biological testing, probably won't correlate much with actual condition in live human cells.

 

[nopatch]

[URL='http://journals.plos.org/plosone/article?id=10.1371/journal.pone.0108342']PLOS ONE: Electronic Cigarette Liquid Increases Inflammation and Virus Infection in Primary Human Airway Epithelial Cells[/URL]
That is the actual study.

 

[Captain Pegleg]

*deleted because I misread the study*

 

[nopatch]

The medium in question is not eliquid. My knowledge in protocals in biological testing is limited . I think the culture medium (or whatever it is called) is infused with E-liqiud up to 0.3%. It means the medium was dosed with a total of max 0.3% eliquid.

Somebody who knows these protocols can explain better.

Thank you for linking!

" cells were pre-treated with medium, tobacco-flavored e-liquid at an optimized concentration (0.3% v/v) without nicotine or with 18 mg/ml of nicotine for 24 h"

This isnt vaping, this is trying to breathe while in a tank of e-liquid as if you had gills, for 24 HOURS

One could argue that over the course of many years of vaping, one would eventually reach 24 hours of having vapor in the lungs, but realistically the body heals itself, repairing tissues and such. Already this study is questionable in it's relevance...
What is "medium e-liquid" with no nicotine? Its pants size? What does medium mean?

My final comment is that this study skips the mouth, throat, and bronchii parts of the passage of vapor on its way to the lungs. I'd imagine the three do their part to lower how harsh vapor is to the lungs.

 

[Captain Pegleg]

You're sure right, I misread it pretty badly.

 

[Robino1]

PLEASE READ! Breaking Links to Junk Science and Other Rubbish Posts | E-Cigarette Forum

 

[Vaslovik]

It's just more shameless rubbish propaganda, and rest assured they will never give up on that. It's about money, and their bottom line. They have zero credibility with me as they are motivated by greed and avarice from the get-go and will quite obviously resort to whatever dirty trick available to them.

 

[jpargana]

(...)
Briefly, they put an electronic cigarette on one end of an e-cigarette sucking machine, and human epithelial cells on the other end. The conclusion is that e-juice damages respiratory cells and compromises immune response. I can't make heads or tails of it, too much science in.
(...)

The real trouble with those kind of studies, is how *little* science it's put into them.

 

[Vaslovik]

They don't care about the science, it's about the money, and so are the so-called "studies". Those doing the studies will gladly take the funding from those with an agenda and say whatever they are being paid to say. I'm quite sure that in some cases no study was ever done, and those with the agenda simply claimed there was.

 

[Nimaz]

Could someone smarter than i am please address this?

The relevant sensationalism du jour:
[URL='http://www.11alive.com/story/news/health/2014/12/26/study-e-cigarettes-damage-healthy-cells/20907631/']Study: E-cigarettes damage healthy cells[/URL]

^Just an example, but most the news says the same thing copied and pasted.

The "source" that most said cut-and-paste jobs are citing:
[URL='http://multimedianewsroom.tv/story.php?id=899&enter=0']Study Links the Liquid Used in E-cigarettes to an Increased Risk of Viral Infections[/URL]

And the study itself:
[URL='http://www.plosone.org/article/info:doi/10.1371/journal.pone.0108342']PLOS ONE: Electronic Cigarette Liquid Increases Inflammation and Virus Infection in Primary Human Airway Epithelial Cells[/URL]

Briefly, they put an electronic cigarette on one end of an e-cigarette sucking machine, and human epithelial cells on the other end. The conclusion is that e-juice damages respiratory cells and compromises immune response. I can't make heads or tails of it, too much science in.
.
.
but,

you all ARE going to die,

,and that's the best excuse i can think of to live large.

Wishing all a healthy and prosperous 2015,

Carpe Annum!

This thread quite old but I decided to respond for general information. I looked at the original study ([URL]http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4171526/[/URL][\plain]) published by Hong Wei Chu principal investigator and Wu Q. who, actually, is the guy who did the experiments (first author). In summary, the study aims to demonstrate that one flavored eliquid (we don't know which flavor) from InnoVapor LLC., Boise (I don’t know them either), with or without nicotine promotes inflammation and increased susceptibility to viral infection in primary human airway epithelial cells in vitro. They used cells that they call "normal cells” prepared from lung tissues “not suitable for transplantation”. They didn’t expose the cells to actual vapor as falsely reported, but they incubated the cells with the chosen eliquid diluted in cell culture media for 24 to 48 hrs. There is 5 figures in this paper:

- Fig 1: the cells don’t die upon ejuice exposure, which is a good thing.

- Fig 2: There is a nicotine independent modest increase of IL6 production (2 to 3 fold max, also note the size of the error bars) with the ejuice at the highest concentration, after 24 and 48hrs exposure. IL6 is a pro-inflammatory cytokine (small proteins) but has many other functions such as epithelial cell survival. Results not too compiling added to the fact that they only have 4 samples (n=4) without any indication of the number of times they did the experiment, certainly because they did it once… Also, there is plenty of other pro-inflammatory cytokines we usually look at to demonstrate inflammation. They didn’t look at them, or maybe they did but didn’t show the data…

- Fig 3: Indirectly, shows that the flavored ejuice [B]promotes human rhinovirus (HRV) infection. [/B]Indirectly, because they looked at virus acid nucleic (RNA) rather that viral titer. That’s ok though, except that n=5 and again without mention of the number of experiments. Also, I am not quite sure why the virus RNA quantities are lower after 24hrs compare to 6hrs.

- Fig 4: The chosen ejuice induces a further increase of IL6 production that the HRV virus alone. In other word they try to show that ejuice promotes more virus induced inflammation. This can be a good thing during an infection? Not compiling with a barely 2-fold effect… Note also, that the increase of IL6 without the virus is no even 2-fold increased which contrast with fig2.

- Fig 5: Attempt to identify the mechanism by which the flavored ejuice may enhances the virus infection…. Just a convenient guess in their partial demonstration, looking only at the RNA w/o analyzing the protein levels, with the same comment regarding the numbers.

This is just a quick summary of the results, with some of my criticisms, all for general information. Overall I think that this study has been quickly done and the results only applied to the flavored ejuice they have selected and therefore, cannot be generalized. Importantly, the ejuice without flavor or ejuices from other suppliers or different flavors have not be used in any experiments.

That said, I cannot claim yet that ejuice vapors don’t have any effects on lung inflammation or predisposition to viral infections but the poor quality of such studies is just frustrating knowing that no many are reading these papers before making public statements. It’s almost like they thought, let’s show that and it’ll work… “Publish or die” as they say in the field… They can add a new line in their publication record, justify the use of tax money provided by the NIH and ask for more, the politics and propagandists can use it in their anti-vaping or regulation agenda… and the firstauthor can move forward in his career[B]. [/B]Using the “risk of vaping” for the youth as a publishing topic seems to work even if the science behind is, in my view point, mediocre.

Flavors may be the main health hazards in ejuices, therefore this risk requires to be quantified in a systematic manner. Developing and validating a cost and timely effective functional assay to test the safety of ejuice flavors may become a requirement in the near future. Still, cigarettes are a known health hazard, but yet many still smoke. Thanks to vaping, we have a relatively safe way out of smoking, at least in my opinion.

 

[Nimaz]

They don't care about the science, it's about the money, and so are the so-called "studies". Those doing the studies will gladly take the funding from those with an agenda and say whatever they are being paid to say. I'm quite sure that in some cases no study was ever done, and those with the agenda simply claimed there was.

I agree with you... I care about the science and I've been often frustrated in the field of research. In general:
1- The investigators need publications to justify funding and apply for more funding by Tax-payers' money provided by the NIH or other agencies.
2- The editorial boards, like in many newspapers, need "sensational topics" to sell their journal. Vaping is in the air at the moment, and investigators know it.
3- The investigators are not paid to say something, but they are aware that, if we show that we will publish. I've seen many papers published in highly quoted peer-reviewed journals because the topics are in the air... Some of them were shown to be false after further investigations...
4- It is very hard to publish negative results, like "ejuice has no effects on lung cells". I've done it though on another topic, and was largely congratulated for my success in this challenge... "How did you do to publish negative results?". Well, I had to find a way to publish my year long study... That was my first publication as a grad student.

Well, this pattern often impairs some businesses, like the salmon farmers when a paper was published in Science Magazine showing that their salmon had more heavy metals than wild-salmon, or benefit others like the homeopathic industry when a paper about "Water Memory" (pure BS) was published in Nature. As for vaping, it's just better than smoking, period! If one think it's unsafe then she/he is free to not vap, yet we need to breakdown the disinformation. I simply like vaping and I don't feel the need of smoking anymore.