I'm starting to think that they know but are milking the subject for as long as they can to gain notoriety and,of course,cold hard cash.
Unbelievable! Prof Christina Gratziou
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http://www.e-cigarette-forum.com/forum/modding-forum/284030-wick-materials-safe-vs-dangerous.html
Nicotine has been noted to directly cause cancer through a number of different mechanisms such as the activation of MAP Kinases. Indirectly, nicotine increases cholinergic signalling (and adrenergic signalling in the case of colon cancer), thereby impeding apoptosis (programmed cell death), promoting tumor growth, and activating growth factors and cellular mitogenic factors such as 5-LOX, and EGF. Nicotine also promotes cancer growth by stimulating angiogenesis and neovascularization. In one study, nicotine administered to mice with tumors caused increases in tumor size (twofold increase), metastasis (nine-fold increase), and tumor recurrence (threefold increase).
So there were a lot of big words there. All you need to know is that if you get cancer in your body (which comes from everywhere at this point) nicotine has been shown to take it from a 1 to a 10 in no time in rats.
So, this is by no means conclusive proof on either count, but please don't consider vaping to be this healthy thing to do. It's a healthIER alternative to smoking, but it's still bad for you - if not physically, then mentally (addiction is ugly). Silica lungs and a bunch of cancer isn't a cool way to die either, if that's the case.
I put it like this in my blog, The Vaper's Handbook which is a Q+A style guide about vaping (link is found below in my signature):
Q7: Is nicotine safe to use all day every day? Is vaping safe?
A7: The answer is very complicated. The consensus is that no one knows 100% for sure. Limited tests have been done on NRT (Nicotine Replacement Therapy) and most of it revolves around Snus (smokeless tobacco), Nicotine Patches, Nicotine Gum, and Nicotine Inhalers, and very little has been done on the ecigarette itself. Scientists can't even agree on what the absorption rate is of the nicotine you vape. Some say 10%, others 40%. What I can tell you with confidence is three things: it's MUCH safer than smoking which has 4000+ chemicals (43 of which are known carcinogens), nicotine levels were found to be very similar in the blood tests among smokers and vapers, and nothing is better than being free of all addictions. A nonsmoker/nonvaper is the healthiest you can be. One should eventually endeavor to wean themselves off of nicotine by decreasing their ejuice to 0mg of nicotine and quit when the physical dependence no longer exists.
This is my reply posted to the youtube video:
This person is paid by Big Pharma to regurgitate anti vaping propaganda. She is nothing more than a shill for corporations who are losing money to people who will not accept their drugs for smoking cessation.
This person is paid by Big Pharma to regurgitate anti vaping propaganda. She is nothing more than a shill for corporations who are losing money to people who will not accept their drugs for smoking cessation.
I wouldn't be so certain of that. Propylene Glycol vapor is a proven safe and effective germicide and antibacterial. I don't know if the less than a teaspoon/day used by most vapers is enough to drastically reduce airborne infections, but it certainly COULD be better than "nothing".
Without the habit-reinforcing MAOIs in some of the other tobacco alkaloids, it is not uncommon for vapers to naturally decrease or stop using nicotine completely when they are certain they will not resume smoking; however, the highly purified nicotine used in most e-cigarettes has not been shown to cause disease but has been shown to be useful in treating the symptoms of attention deficit and depression disorders. As long as you don't have all the attendant risks and hazards of lighting something on fire and inhaling smoke 100's of times per day, choosing to self-medicate with ad hoc administration of a small percentage of natural plant alkaloids like caffeine and nicotine in flavored liquids/vapor seems like a reasonable choice for an educated adult, don't you think?
ShogaNinja said:
If a non-nicotine user is the healthiest I can be, I can tell you with confidence I'd rather be dead.
I don't feel all that healthy when every time I go from one room into another, I have to stop and wrack my brain to try to remember what I was going there to do. I don't feel very healthy when I can't maintain enough concentration to read the newspaper. By the time I get to paragraph #2, it is making no sense because I can't recall what I read in paragraph #1. I don't feel very healthy when I begin gaining 5 pounds a week. And I sure didn't feel very healthy when I couldn't stop crying and started sleeping 12 hours out of every 24 -- only not consecutively. I actually started pondering what might be the least painful way to commit suicide.
Maybe YOU are healthiest when you stop using nicotine. Many people are. In fact, probably the majority of people are. But do NOT assume that what happens with your body under a particular set of circumstances is universal. Although I did not have a personal history of depression, I do have a family history of depression and the last time I "overcame my addiction" I dropped into a suicidal emotional abyss. I had no personal history of attention / concentration problems, but all of my cousins did (children of my mother's twin sister--I was an only child.)
When I sought medical help, I was told that all my symptoms are temporary...that they would peak and then subside over 2 weeks.
Uh-huh. And if you believe that, I have a nice bridge....
Antidepressant medication took care of the worst of the depressive symptoms, but the brain problems persisted. It took an incredible amount of will power for me to fight to stay awake, to look right-left-right-left every time I was driving and had to make a turn (my visual memory was impaired). When I was finally able to try to go back to work (after having been in antidepressant medication for a month) I found it frustrating to keep making stupid mistakes and having to redo my work over and over and over. It was also frightening. I felt sure that sooner or later, my lack of productivity would make me lose my job. I was also frightened because my symptoms seemed so much like dementia, and my mother was then in the early stages (she died in 2009 of Lewy Body Dementia after years of slowly losing her mobility and her sanity.)
I kept looking for solutions.
One time I went to a Nicotine Anonymous meeting and asked the group whether anyone had these kinds of problems--especially the cognitive problems that ruined the quality and quantity of work I could do. One woman said she did. "How did you solve it?" I asked. She responded, "I took early retirement."
That answer hit me like a ton of bricks. They don't give you an early retirement option when you're only 45 years old.
After suffering through all this for six months, waiting for my so-called withdrawal symptoms to heal, I went back to the doctor and asked for some type of treatment that would make my brain start working normally again. The doctor told me that there was no approved medication she could prescribe for me. She said that many smokers do experience depression, anxiety, difficulty concentrating, and attention problems, and memory lapses when they go off nicotine. She even pointed out that the creative type of work I was doing was especially vulnerable to the absence of nicotine.
At that point I didn't "fall off the wagon." I made a conscious decision to go back to smoking but vowed to continue trying to find a way to stop smoking without having to sacrifice my cognitive and emotional health.
Tobacco Harm Reduction (THR), substituting less hazardous products that contain nicotine for the practice of smoking, is what saved me. I was looking for the "e-cigarette" before it was even invented. I read an article that said if smokers were offered something that looked kind of like a cigarette and provided nicotine without subjecting the body to the perils of smoke, that millions of lives could be saved. So I went looking on the internet for something that could be substituted for smoking and found an e-cigar back in 2007. Unfortunately that did not work for me because it wasn't an acceptable substitute. It tasted like -- well, a cigar! I tried, I really tried, but I just could not hack that flavor. Then about a year later the company that sold me the electronic cigar offered me a free starter kit for their newest product, an electronic cigarette.
I had to do some more digging and some experimentation before I found a nicotine strength that kept all my cognitive problems under control, but I did it. I finally stopped all smoking in March of 2009.
I am not recommending that YOU practice THR, ShogaNinja, if you don't need need nicotine to function. If you can cut down on your nicotine strength with no ill effects, go for it! THR is for those who get sick without nicotine. It is a life-saver for those with a personal or family history of depression, anxiety, and cognitive impairments.
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maybe she should take that pharma check and get some dental work..... , i'm sorry vocalek that sounds like self justification to me, your a nicotine addict, as am i and your making excuses to stay that way, change the mindset, nicotine is one nasty ...., but the stuff your mentioning sounds to me like mental heath issues/topics, it could be very dangerous to just say it's nicotine and call it a day, i'd be seeing a specialist if i were you
Maybe you should read the nicotine research being done that shows clear proof that nicotine therapy is a good thing for many people, rather than attack a member for telling her story.
Don't confuse nicotine with burning tobacco with all it's additions to hook users including MAOI's
No it hasn't. It might do in rodents - but since the effect is not seen in humans even over many decades of unrestricted consumption (without smoke), it is proper to question the knowledge or motives of those implying that there is some sort of similar effect in humans.
Where is the proof of this, or even any evidence? A couple of people getting arythmias from massive over-consumption does not make a substance 'nasty', any more than coffee or aspirin is. Indeed there is no evidence that in humans nicotine has any more risk than coffee.
The propaganda paid for by the pharmaceutical industry is powerful and pervasive, so much so that people not only believe it but take it as fact. People like Gratziou are paid by the world's biggest criminal fraudsters [1] to promote their propaganda, and they simply don't care about the thousands of lives put at risk as a result. It's probably "just the cost of doing business", as a pharma exec reportedly told the Chicago Tribune, commenting on the huge fines for fraud and corruption they pay.
We already know that ecigs are thousands of times safer than Chantix so there doesn't need to be a debate about that [2].
So what do we know about nicotine that has any factual basis or clinical evidence? Try this:
1. The only large-scale long-term data on ad lib nicotine consumption, by tens of thousands of people over several decades, is the Snus data from Sweden. This data shows clear population-level effects in the national health statistics, and is supported by more than 150 clinical studies over more than two decades. The NRT user data is smaller and shorter in timescale by comparison, but the biggest difference is there is no visible effect on national health, in direct contrast to the Swedish situation where public health has been dramatically affected (and is known as the Swedish Miracle).
2. The data from Sweden concerns the large number of smokers who either switched to Snus or started with it instead of smoking, resulting in Sweden's smoking prevalence being 40% lower than that of comparable countries, and the effect on their health and that of the population at large. Essentially, it shows that ad lib consumption of nicotine without smoke, over decades, by hundreds of thousands of people, has little statistically-visible negative effect on health. Indeed the exact opposite is the case: Sweden has the lowest levels of whatever can be measured associated with smoking disease or death in Europe and in the developed world. If nicotine 'causes cancer' or even 'promotes cancer' or 'assists cancer' in humans then this situation would not exist.
3. To be specific:
a. Sweden has the lowest level of smoking-related mortality [3] in the developed world by a wide margin. If nicotine was carcinogenic, this would not be the case [4].
b. Only about 8% or 9% of Swedish men smoke, and as a result Sweden has the lowest rate of male lung cancer and oral cancer in Europe. If nicotine was carcinogenic, this would not be the case, since more than 20% of Swedish men use Snus.
c. Giant-scale meta-analyses of Snus studies, by Lee and Hamlin, show that:
i. Snus does not elevate risk for any disease. This includes any kind of cancer. Thus, long-term ad lib consumption of nicotine over decades does not increase risk for any cancer, including oral cancer or pancreatic cancer.
ii. The health outcomes for smokers who quit and smokers who switch to Snus are the same. The Snus consumers don't get any more cancers than the non-smokers.
iii. A Snus user has the same risk as a non-smoker (the medical term for an ex-smoker). A Snus user is no more likely to get cancer than any other ex-smoker.
iv. Since more than 20% of Swedish men use Snus, some sort of cancers should be visible in the population if nicotine causes or assists cancer in any way. They aren't. A huge and absolutely unmissable effect is seen from 20% smoking in other countries; even a small effect would still be visible in a country like Sweden with good data collection. There is no cancer effect from Snus and therefore nicotine.
In these giant scale studies, trials with errors, unreliable data and where the clinicians refused to give details of how they measured certain data were excluded. In other words, faulty trials or those with some kind of pre-ordained agenda were not included.
What the Swedish data tells us is this: long-term unrestricted nicotine use, at least in this population, does not lead to cancer. This isn't evidence, or some other form of transitional information: it is proven fact.
You must therefore accept that nicotine does not cause or assist cancer in any way (in humans); or argue that its combination with other materials when supplied in Snus leads to complete and total negation of any cancer-causing effect. Either is a valid approach although the second position seems less tenable.
Please don't accept the propaganda paid for by giant-scale criminals and presented by their hired liars as fact.
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[1] BBC NEWS | Business | Pfizer agrees record fraud fine
Pharmaceutical industry fraud fines reach new record level - Blog
[2] NHS Quit Smoking: Massive Fail - ref #7
Tobacco Harm Reduction UK - Part 2 - search: chantix
[3] Or 'tobacco-related mortality' if you prefer; but since tobacco doesn't kill, at least in Sweden, it is more accurate to say 'smoking-related mortality' at least in Sweden; since due to the national statistics and the large quantity of clinical data we can clearly see that smoking kills there, not tobacco consumption.
[4] Swedes consume just as much nicotine as anyone else. In fact there is some data that seems to show they might even consume more than others, although this would need investigation. For example: the 2011 stats show that 11% of Swedes smoke (an average of male/female numbers, more women smoke as more men than women use Snus), and 20% of Swedes use Snus. The number of smokers is falling and the number of Snus consumers is rising each year. Even allowing for some dual-use, these numbers seem to indicate that there may be more tobacco users in Sweden than in other comparable countries.
Two things can be stated with certainty:
a. There are a lot of tobacco users in Sweden, certainly no less than anywhere else comparable (and possibly more).
b. There is less smoking-related cancer than anywhere else comparable, and not just a small amount less - a considerable amount less. Allowing for the timelapse effect whereby health stats react to health-affecting activity after a decade or more, it appears that Sweden will eventually see a total reduction in morbidity and mortality equivalent to the reduction in smoking. This is reinforced by the clinical study data, which is the same: Snus users don't get cancer (or anything else).
There is a very small increase in risk for stroke hinted at by the meta-analyses but this is not statistically significant, it is just visible above the background noise.
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If by "mental health issues" you are talking about behaviors that respond to cognitive behavior therapy (CBT), changing the mindset can help. However, it's important for those who treat potential mental-health issues to be able to recognize the difference between exogenous and endogenous depression.
Endogenous depression is a type of depression which is caused by genetic factors. You don’t have to lose someone close or to encounter a life problem in order to develop endogenous depression and that’s why it was called "Endo" because it comes from within. Endogenous depression can't be cured by CBT because that type of depression has a physiological cause, not a an environmental cause. There is no real cure for endogenous depression. Effective treatments alleviate the symptoms but do not eliminate the cause--an imbalance in neurotransmitters.
Changing one's mindset does not control symptoms of endogenous depression, anxiety, attention deficit disorders, short-term memory problems, or prevent the build-up of alpha-synuclein proteins in the brain.
Nicotine does control these symptoms and often has fewer dangerous side-effects than the medications usually prescribed for these conditions--if, indeed treatment is provided at all.
Researchers are experimenting with using transdermal nicotine as treatment for depression, anxiety, attention deficit disorder, and even combinations of these conditions.
Nicotine Lessens Symptoms Of Depression In Nonsmokers
Anxiety, anxiety disorders, tobacco use, and ni... [Psychol Bull. 2007] - PubMed - NCBI
DocGuide
Transdermal Nicotine in Adult ADHD With Depression and Anxiety
Discovery Health "How can nicotine be good for me?"
Lewy Body Dementia (also called Dementia with Lewy bodies) is a form of dementia that shares characteristics with both Alzheimer's and Parkinson's diseases.
Lewy body dementia - MayoClinic.com
Dementia With Lewy Bodies Information Page: National Institute of Neurological Disorders and Stroke (NINDS)
DLB is most often not diagnosed until later stages of the disease. (This is also true with Alzheimer's) Someone in the early stages may be diagnosed with depression and sent to a psychologist or social worker for talk therapy. When that doesn't work, they might be sent to a psychiatrist or MD and prescribed an antidepressant. When that doesn't work, they may be prescribed a second antidepressant to be taken in addition to the first one.
You say that nicotine is a mean ....? What about the alternatives? In this handout for a drug often prescribed in addition to one's first antidepressant, notice particularly the section on serious side effects: http://www.abilify.com/pdf/treating-depression-hcp.pdf
Most doctors would not prescribe acetylcholinesterase inhibitors to someone with cognitive impairments that appeared when nicotine use was discontinued.
Early Diagnosis of Dementia - February 15, 2001 - American Family Physician
More extensive testing, wait for six to nine months and then test again. But no treatment. Reread what I wrote: I lasted six months. I consulted a specialist, as you suggested. She told me that there wasn't anything she could prescribe that would fix problems in my brain.
At the time that this occurred, I had never heard of DLB. I stumbled onto information about it as I was trying to figure out how to help my mother, whose confusion and illogical decisions were getting progressively worse. I learned that DLB is caused by a buildup of proteins called Lewy Bodies in the brain. I also discovered this research:
Smoking and Parkinson
Bottom line: Nicotine is effective in preventing the build-up of Lewy Bodies in the brain which explains why smokers have lower rates of Parkinson's Disease and LBD. Association between lifetime cigarette smoking ... [Brain Pathol. 2010] - PubMed - NCBI
By the time my mother died of Lewy Body dementia, she could not get out of bed. She was so delusional that she believed a demon was living on top of her TV set. We tried removing the TV, but her demon persisted. If there is even a slim chance that continuing to use nicotine could prevent or even postpone the development of LBD in me, I'm taking it.
Keep in mind that what one person views as "excuses" may be viewed by others as "good reasons."
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He is a thread from the Vaping TV and Radio forum here on e-cigarette forum. The actual interview is in the thread. Everyone needs to watch this: Greek Cardiologist studies vaping vs smoking - Interview on VapeTeam show this Wednesday
I was asked by a few people to weigh in on some of the comments from the last day or so on this thread. Judging from the name of the thread, the conversation has drifted rather off the original topic, though these comments actually could be applied to the original I am guessing. Am just going to make some general points of broad usefulness, since several others have addressed the specifics in detail.
Statements of "<exposure> can cause <disease> via <mechanism>" are a dime a dozen. Identifying a way that a particular exposure could theoretically cause an outcome is easy. But if the exposure does not actually cause that outcome, as has been noted in this case for nicotine not causing any measurable risk for cancer in users, then the dime a dozen is 10 cents too expensive. There is no value in identifying why E might cause D when E does not actually cause D. This is the upshot of the the toxicology oriented posts in the Lies blog: toxicology | Anti-THR Lie of the Day Be careful about falling into the trap (whether set by yourself or someone else) of confusing theoretical mechanism with outcome. Of course, if E does cause D, then it is useful to figure out why, but that is a different story.
FWIW, almost all of the attention about nicotine contributing to cancer is focused on its promotion of the growth of new blood vessels (which, when it occurs in a tumor, can make cancer grow faster). Incidentally, that is known as "angiogenesis", but notice how easy it is to describe in readily understandable terms rather than burying the point behind jargon.
As for those making judgmental statements about people's behavior choices: If you are going to use the term "addiction" as a negative epithet, you really need to define what you are saying (there is no accepted scientific definition for the term) and explain why it is so bad. I find it surprising that people posting on a THR-oriented forum would make the statement, in effect, "a particular behavioral choice would be preferable for me, so therefore it is best for everyone else". It is even more surprising that in response to someone saying "that might be true for you, but I am quite confident it is not true for me" someone would unequivocally declare that response to be wrong. That self-centered attitude might be typical for ANTZ or other nanny-state discussions, but it is very strange to see it here.
Statements of "<exposure> can cause <disease> via <mechanism>" are a dime a dozen. Identifying a way that a particular exposure could theoretically cause an outcome is easy. But if the exposure does not actually cause that outcome, as has been noted in this case for nicotine not causing any measurable risk for cancer in users, then the dime a dozen is 10 cents too expensive. There is no value in identifying why E might cause D when E does not actually cause D. This is the upshot of the the toxicology oriented posts in the Lies blog: toxicology | Anti-THR Lie of the Day Be careful about falling into the trap (whether set by yourself or someone else) of confusing theoretical mechanism with outcome. Of course, if E does cause D, then it is useful to figure out why, but that is a different story.
FWIW, almost all of the attention about nicotine contributing to cancer is focused on its promotion of the growth of new blood vessels (which, when it occurs in a tumor, can make cancer grow faster). Incidentally, that is known as "angiogenesis", but notice how easy it is to describe in readily understandable terms rather than burying the point behind jargon.
As for those making judgmental statements about people's behavior choices: If you are going to use the term "addiction" as a negative epithet, you really need to define what you are saying (there is no accepted scientific definition for the term) and explain why it is so bad. I find it surprising that people posting on a THR-oriented forum would make the statement, in effect, "a particular behavioral choice would be preferable for me, so therefore it is best for everyone else". It is even more surprising that in response to someone saying "that might be true for you, but I am quite confident it is not true for me" someone would unequivocally declare that response to be wrong. That self-centered attitude might be typical for ANTZ or other nanny-state discussions, but it is very strange to see it here.
I think we just have a few people that bought into Allen Carr's book and/or spent too much time on the WhyQuit.net website.
At least I hope that's all this is, because I'd hate to think we have moles lurking around here.
At least I hope that's all this is, because I'd hate to think we have moles lurking around here.
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I just saw this video and it ...... me off so much. She didn't say smoke instead of vaping, but it felt like that. She said there are other smoking cessation products out there that are "better", but she fails to realize or mention that they have extremely poor success rate. The effects that she talks about are only temporary and occur in the first few days of getting used to vaping. This is just my 
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Agreed! I would rather have minor coughing then these common side effects!
In clinical trials, the most common side effects of CHANTIX include:
Nausea (30%)
Sleep problems (trouble sleeping, changes in dreaming)
Constipation
Gas
Vomiting
This has been taken directly from the Chantix website. This list doesn't mention the severe side effects on the most common ones!
In clinical trials, the most common side effects of CHANTIX include:
Nausea (30%)
Sleep problems (trouble sleeping, changes in dreaming)
Constipation
Gas
Vomiting
This has been taken directly from the Chantix website. This list doesn't mention the severe side effects on the most common ones!
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I seem to recall many reports of more serious side effects...
Like wanting to kill yourself, and/or wanting to kill others.
I think there were more, but that should be enough.
I couldn't agree more!!! Those severe side effects sounds the same as those bath salts!
A snippet of just the psychological side effects of Varenicline reads like the list of side effects from a Zombie bite: "Anxiety, depression, emotional disorder, irritability, restlessness, aggression, agitation, disorientation, dissociation, decreased libido, mood swings, abnormal thinking, bradyphrenia, euphoric mood, hallucination, psychotic disorder, suicidal ideation, and erratic behavior have also been reported. " More here: Chantix Side Effects | Drugs.com
Who is Dr. Michael Siegel?
And here he rips huge holes in the absurd and dangerous press release that accompanied this video...
http://tobaccoanalysis.blogspot.com/2012/09/experts-from-university-of-athens-tell.html
And here he rips huge holes in the absurd and dangerous press release that accompanied this video...
http://tobaccoanalysis.blogspot.com/2012/09/experts-from-university-of-athens-tell.html
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I don't like the mysogynistic implications of the phrase used by DC2 to describe this apology for a doctor, although it is absolutely perfect for this kind of scum. If it was a man I'd use the same phrase or one for the male equivalent. These bought and paid for medics contribute to corrupt regulation-enforced large-scale mortality for profit, and in a perfect world they'd be struck off the medical register.
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I have to second this. Ideally, the healthiest is a never-nicotine user. Once a person is addicted to nicotine, quitting can have negative effects on some people (by far not all of them).
After smoking 1-2 PAD, I have successfully quit (with welbutrin and nicorette) for 2 years. Got to a point when I didn't have cravings or anything. I did become an insufferable pain to be around. My irritability was so bad that my wife begged me to start smoking again. Vaping for 2 months, no cravings, and no desire to murder anyone yet.
My father quit smoking after 30-some years. Gained about 180 lbs, got diabetes, lost both kidneys, spent a few years on dialysis, got a transplant, still has diabetes.
So yes, while most people that quit nicotine completely are indeed healthier, there are few cases where smoking related health risks were replaced with non-smoking related health risks.
I'll take the ill defined and ill researched vaping related risks over both. Knowing that it's most likely not completely healthy.
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