After much time deliberating (I kind of knew I'd make this switch after the paranoia got to me enough) I've decided to finish off/sell the last of my flavored e-liquid and switch to straight VG/nic base.
The information is just way too flim-flammy right now, and measurements for AP/diacetyl are sort of inconsequential or impossible to quantify because we don't know how much damage the stuff actually does. You've got some people saying to avoid the stuff, then you've got other people saying it's totally harmless. The argument that "there are 100x the levels" in cigarettes seems sort of confusing, and the "people get popcorn lung but think it's COPD" thing is also silly, because popcorn lung is far more severe than COPD (based on information I've found).
But the biggest problem is the lack of effort being made, on the part of juice companies, to remove these potentially harmful chemicals from their e-juice. "Oh but nyiddle, if it's not one thing it's another" well yeah, but this is something we are pretty sure isn't good to be inhaling, and no effort is being made to eradicate or minimize it from juice recipes. It's irresponsible. Not to mention, in the cases of companies that have supposedly eliminated diacetyl/AP from their e-liquids, they're often tested to find out the diacetyl/AP is still absolutely there! (You know who I'm talking about).
"Harm reduction" means exactly that. Obviously vaping will never be 100% safe (nothing is). But think about this, you could go smoking your whole life and potentially, potentially, never see any negative repercussions from it. Of course, you could smoke and get a horrible illness and live a terribly short life, it happens all the time. But imagine (hypothetically) in 5 years all these kids in their 20's who picked up vaping when they were 19 start suffering bronchiolitis obliterans. It's possible (though a slim possibility, I'll admit) they could have smoked their entire life and not seen negative repercussions. In this hypothetical situation, vaping is the opposite of harm reduction.
I'm not saying there's any truth to this idea that diketones are potentially screwing us all over, but at this point in time you'd be lying if you said "we really don't know," and the lack of information is scary. Even scarier is how nonchalant people seem to be about it. In the case of the factory workers they were exposed to something in the "ppb" (parts per billion) of diacetyl every day, for 8 hours. However, when analyzed, e-juice's diacetyl levels are meassured in the "ppm" (parts per million). That's 1000x more than found in factories. Nobody seems to mention this glaringly spooky fact: Our e-juice contains upwards of 1000x more diacetyl than the factory workers were exposed to, for 8 hours a day. What does this really mean for our health?
Nobody knows.
So this was a pretty big rant, and I expect it to prompt some (ideally) non-derogatory, meaningful, and informative discussion. Otherwise, I suppose, get out the pitchforks. ----E
On a side note -- anyone know of any good vendors for pre-mixed VG+nicotine?
The information is just way too flim-flammy right now, and measurements for AP/diacetyl are sort of inconsequential or impossible to quantify because we don't know how much damage the stuff actually does. You've got some people saying to avoid the stuff, then you've got other people saying it's totally harmless. The argument that "there are 100x the levels" in cigarettes seems sort of confusing, and the "people get popcorn lung but think it's COPD" thing is also silly, because popcorn lung is far more severe than COPD (based on information I've found).
But the biggest problem is the lack of effort being made, on the part of juice companies, to remove these potentially harmful chemicals from their e-juice. "Oh but nyiddle, if it's not one thing it's another" well yeah, but this is something we are pretty sure isn't good to be inhaling, and no effort is being made to eradicate or minimize it from juice recipes. It's irresponsible. Not to mention, in the cases of companies that have supposedly eliminated diacetyl/AP from their e-liquids, they're often tested to find out the diacetyl/AP is still absolutely there! (You know who I'm talking about).
"Harm reduction" means exactly that. Obviously vaping will never be 100% safe (nothing is). But think about this, you could go smoking your whole life and potentially, potentially, never see any negative repercussions from it. Of course, you could smoke and get a horrible illness and live a terribly short life, it happens all the time. But imagine (hypothetically) in 5 years all these kids in their 20's who picked up vaping when they were 19 start suffering bronchiolitis obliterans. It's possible (though a slim possibility, I'll admit) they could have smoked their entire life and not seen negative repercussions. In this hypothetical situation, vaping is the opposite of harm reduction.
I'm not saying there's any truth to this idea that diketones are potentially screwing us all over, but at this point in time you'd be lying if you said "we really don't know," and the lack of information is scary. Even scarier is how nonchalant people seem to be about it. In the case of the factory workers they were exposed to something in the "ppb" (parts per billion) of diacetyl every day, for 8 hours. However, when analyzed, e-juice's diacetyl levels are meassured in the "ppm" (parts per million). That's 1000x more than found in factories. Nobody seems to mention this glaringly spooky fact: Our e-juice contains upwards of 1000x more diacetyl than the factory workers were exposed to, for 8 hours a day. What does this really mean for our health?
Nobody knows.
So this was a pretty big rant, and I expect it to prompt some (ideally) non-derogatory, meaningful, and informative discussion. Otherwise, I suppose, get out the pitchforks. ----E
On a side note -- anyone know of any good vendors for pre-mixed VG+nicotine?
