OMG You're All Gonna Die! Again!

[Racehorse]

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

That is because vaping is harm-reduction for people who switch from smoking.

But probably not harm-free.

"As much as" is a relative phrase. The truth is, we need to know exactly how much. "Not as much as analog cigarettes" can mean a bit less, or a lot less.

In one person, damage to epithelial cells may cause the cells to go crazy and they get a chronic illness. In some other person, maybe not.

We don't know.

 

[Scottitude]

This thread quite old but I decided to respond for general information. I looked at the original study (http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4171526/) 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 promotes human rhinovirus (HRV) infection. 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. 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:

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

Thanks

 

[Robino1]

And I've broken the link. Please read the link I've posted earlier in regards to WHY we break these links. Scottitude was kind enough to repost the link.

We are not suppressing the articles, we just don't want to give them more traction and be linked back to ECF. By breaking the link, if someone wants to see the junk, all the have to do is copy and paste it into their browser.

 

[Nimaz]

@Nimaz:


Thanks

I just found out manager's rule before I read your message, but I just did it again in another thread I opened... Sorry! It was not junk science though. Anyway, I'll make sure to follow that rule.

 

[skoony]

It is my experience when reviewing these study's that use cells it is very
easy to cause damage at the cellular level. similar studies using healthy
lung tissue do not seem to show any significant nor lasting harm.
Testing things at the component level makes sense for things
like car engines however, we are not engines. A lot of components
would already have failed or in the process of failing before an engine
throws a rod or fouls a plug. A failed oil pump will seize up an engine
just as quick as removing the drain plug or disconnecting the radiator
or,dozens of other things. A well maintained engine should run quite
well for its expected life cycle. Deliberately stressing key components
can and will cause total failure of the whole system.
We should be looking at what vaping does to the lungs as a whole.
when that approach is used it appears the results are quite good.

Regards
Mike

 

[Nimaz]

Actually, there is a recently published study that contradict the inflammatory results:
"Acute Exposure to Electronic and Combustible Cigarette Aerosols: Effects in an Animal Model and in Human Alveolar Cells."@ ww w.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/p ubmed/26272212. There is no IL6 increased after ecig treatment in the new in vivo study... Also, I analysed and commented above on the results of the quoted paper and found the whole paper pretty sketchy.

 

[Robert Cromwell]

My thoughts on this subject after reading numerous articles on vaping.
Reasonable vaping is FAR safer than smoking.
Is vaping totally without risk? NO.
We will not fully understand the risks associated for a long time.
And those risks will vary widely depending on vaping style, flavorings and other ingredients used, etc.

Just my thoughts on it while I keep on vapin.

 

[Nimaz]

My thoughts on this subject after reading numerous articles on vaping.
Reasonable vaping is FAR safer than smoking.
Is vaping totally without risk? NO.
We will not fully understand the risks associated for a long time.
And those risks will vary widely depending on vaping style, flavorings and other ingredients used, etc.

Just my thoughts on it while I keep on vapin.

I totally agree! I felt the benefit of vaping over smoking right after I started and switched. Indeed I am a bit choked when I watch how some vapers are performing on YouTube... I am appreciative of the progress make in the technology such as temperature controlled devices in response of some raised heath issues. Also, there are cleaner diketone(Acetoin, Acetyl Propionyl)-free flavor concentrates now available for a better control of the composition of our juices. At the end, it seems a lot about personal choices a bit like choosing what we put on our plate and how much we eat.

 

[Robert Cromwell]

Because of the differing vaping styles and equipment and juice compositions it will be very difficult to determine risk factors for vaping.
Cigarettes were pretty much all the same. Either filtered or unfiltered and had basically the same ingredients in them. Not so much with vaping.

 

[Nimaz]

This is where I believe individual decision takes place. The long term risks and benefits of vaping will depend on these choices. If potentially toxic compounds from some flavors such as tobacco extracts can be provided to our blood stream through vapor, other beneficial compounds may do so too, like anti-oxidants in raspberry juices for example. There is obvious caveats but the possibility is not unlikely. I also understand that long term ex-smokers may be careless after decades of toxic smoke inhalation. I don't have a Mass Spectrometer in hand, but I would love to determine what's in my vapor for the sake of curiosity. This is why I am switching to DYI rather than commercial ejuices. I can choose somehow the ingredients, like DX flavor concentrates. I also found that I'm not addicted to vaping as much as I was to cigs. For instance, vaping is not the first thing I do after I wake up, maybe because of the relatively low addictive value of nicotine on its own.

 

[Robert Cromwell]

Like you Nimaz I DIY all my juice. but for a different reason. Most commercial juices have some artificial ingredients in them that I cannot tolerate both due to chemical taste and physical impacts on my body.
I wind up discarding about 25% of the flavorings I try due to these complications, but am building up a good base of ones I can tolerate.

 

[uzsibox]

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

you should come to hungary where we have state sanctioned tobacco shops and you have to order ejuice from neighbouring countries because over here selling nicotine products are deemed pharmacutical only hence illegal by a private vendor. so basicly what the state is telling us that a tobacco shop is a pharmacy

 

[Robert Cromwell]

you should come to hungary where we have state sanctioned tobacco shops and you have to order ejuice from neighbouring countries because over here selling nicotine products are deemed pharmacutical only hence illegal by a private vendor. so basicly what the state is telling us that a tobacco shop is a pharmacy

That was the only way to legally get alcohol during prohibition over here in the USA many years ago.
You had to get a prescription for it and get it at the pharmacy.