The nicotine absorption contradiction

[rolygate]

PSA:

I have some serious issues with what has been said here about Nicotine. A simple google search will reveal to you that it causes Pancreatic Cancer. When the Swiss started using Snus to quit smoking they reduced the amount of smokers by drastic amounts but they found that people were still coming down with pancreatic cancer. It's also a known health risk for those who chew gum or use the patch (gum can cause oral cancer as well). Please get it out of your heads that you can vape forever and be ok. The answer is, you can't. This stuff kills you too.

I would disagree with some of the statements you have made, and agree with one.

You are basically repeating propaganda that has been very successfully promulgated by antis funded by the pharmaceutical industry. For example:

• A Google search will reveal what has been successfully publicised. Most medical literature is not available to Google searches. Propaganda from the pharmaceutical industry rules on Google - they have the most powerful propaganda machine on earth.
• Nicotine cannot cause any disease. There is no generally accepted research anywhere that shows nicotine as causing disease. Indeed, there is a data mountain available that proves it doesn't.
• There is no accepted evidence that nicotine causes pancreatic cancer. Of more than 150 clinical studies into Snus users in Sweden, over nearly 30 years, almost all showed that Snus (and therefore ad lib consumption of nicotine without smoke over several decades) has no elevation of risk for any disease. Two or three trials showed an increase of risk for pancreatic cancer. When examining the evidence for something, if 100 sources show one result and 1 source shows another, you generally go with the 100.
• At least one of the trials that showed an increase in risk for pancreatic cancer was shown to have been run improperly.
• The giant scale meta analysis of Snus research (89 studies) by Lee & Hamlin clearly showed there was no increase of risk for pancreatic cancer.
• The vast mountain of data for Snus, over several decades, shows no increase in risk for any disease. A small increase in risk for stroke appears to be present, but below a statistically relevant figure.
• As far as I am aware, Snus is not popular in Switzerland. In Sweden, when the number of smokers was reduced by around 40% by free access to Snus, the deaths from pancreatic cancer reduced by the same amount. Snus does not elevate risk for any disease and that includes pancreatic cancer. Sweden has the lowest rates of male lung cancer, oral cancer and pancreatic cancer in the EU - by some distance. There is an argument the difference would be far more visible if other countries data collection was as efficient.

Regarding your statement of the risks surrounding e-cigarette use, since we know exactly what is in them, and since millions of users worldwide, for many years, have suffered not one single incident of mortality or morbidity attributable to an e-cigarette, it is reasonable to assume the risk is quite low. Note that in exactly the same timescale, a quit-smoking medicine, introduced at the same time, has killed hundreds of people and caused hundreds of thousands of heart attacks (Chantix).

Many people would say that smoking tobacco cigarettes is probably at least 1,000 times more dangerous. Nevertheless, no activity of this kind can be without risk, and one would have to agree with you that some will be injured as a result; perhaps if 400,000 a year die from smoking, 400 might die from vaping. Perhaps even as many as 4,000, especially where previously-existing smoking disease is exacerbated by vaping, and the individuals concerned cannot quit either of the two. I believe there is a risk to sufferers of smoking-related emphysema, for example.

As far as your statement "This stuff kills you too" is concerned - no it doesn't. At least, not yet. And it is probably not a good idea to quote junk science and propaganda to try and make the point.

So let's do the maths:

• In 6 years, smoking has killed about 2.5 million in the US.
• In 6 years, Chantix has killed several hundred and ruined the lives of thousands.
• In 6 years, e-cigarettes haven't killed anyone or ruined anyone's life.

For me, the choice is obvious - as long as the government allows me a choice, that is. It seems their good friends in pharma don't want me to have that choice.

You are right to say vaping has risks. Those risks will be much higher for some individuals, and they mostly know exactly who they are. Those risks are as yet unknown, but will probably congregate around individuals with smoking-related lung disease.

To say that vaping has known or significant risks is just plain wrong - all the evidence opposes that. However, the world's biggest criminal fraudsters and propagandists certainly don't want you to know this.

Your statement: "Many of us have already become complacent in our original mission to quit and I am here to give you a shot of reality. QUIT. All of it. Stay true to the mission you set out to accomplish."

While this may be true of some vapers, it is clear to me that most were looking for a way to keep smoking but without the risk - which is what the e-cigarette was invented by Han Li for in the first place.

On the other hand there are people who quit vaping eventually, after switching to ecigs from smoking, when they never intended to. That seems quite interesting.

 

[DC2]

Users of nicotine achieve a state of hyperglycemia, high blood sugar. This is why they tend to eat less and also why they tend to gain weight when they quit.

I had never heard this one before so I used your Google suggestion...
Nicotine and High blood sugar (Hyperglycemia) - eHealthMe

This is a post-marketing study of High blood sugar (Hyperglycemia) among people who take Nicotine.
The study is created by eHealthMe based on 25 reports from FDA and user community.

On Jun, 12, 2012: 4,058 people reported to have side effects when taking Nicotine. Among them, 25 people (0.62%) have High Blood Sugar

I think I'll drop that from my list of concerns.
Anybody else reading this is free to draw their own conclusions.

Vaping should only be a means to an end, a stepping stone on the path to nicotine addiction recovery.

Thanks for the advice, but my end is to be done with smoking, and I've already accomplished that.

But then again, I'm not addicted to nicotine, so "nicotine addiction recovery" is not on my list of needs.
However I do use it, and will continue to use it, for the benefits I gain from doing so.

Again, this is a personal choice, and it is one that won't be swayed by the Anti-Smoking propaganda.

 

[ShogaNinja]

A simple Google search will also show you that e-cigarettes contain carcinogens and numerous toxins. These assertions are demonstrably false, as is the assertion that nicotine causes pancreatic cancer. There was one study that claimed to show higher risk for pancreatic cancer among smokeless tobacco users. However, the author has a reputation for cherry-picking studies.

Dr. Brad Rodu has critiqued the methodology of that study and he recently wrote about a new study.



http://rodutobaccotruth.blogspot.com/2011/02/new-study-smokeless-tobacco-is-not.html

Psychology Today is not considered a journal of the hard sciencees. The article you linked to does not provide an author's name, nor does it list the scientific references for the assertions made. Although there has been a link shown between smoking and developing diabetis, those who quit develop Type II diabetis at a higher rate than continuing smokers. The MRFIT study was the first to show this effect. Here is a link to the abstract of a more recent study: Annals of Internal Medicine | Smoking, Smoking Cessation, and Risk for Type 2 Diabetes Mellitus: A Cohort Study

Dr. Rodu notes:

http://rodutobaccotruth.blogspot.com/2010/01/quitting-smoking-increases-diabetes.html

So you say that the first link I grabbed off of a gigantic google search wasn't "hard science" and then you link some silly blog?

A simple search on Wikipedia reveals the following:

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).

And by the way there are many "hard science" citations in this article. Perhaps you should read that?

You'd have to be a fool to believe that the mass intake of a known toxin has no negative effects.

 

[kristin]

When I first started coming here I was rather appalled to see a thread that said that smoking is about as bad for you as a caffeine habit. This is simply not true.

You're correct, that statement is not true. However, the comparison we make is between SMOKE-FREE nicotine (low-risk, smoke-free tobacco products & e-cigarettes) and caffeine, not SMOKING and caffeine. If a whole thread stated more than once that smoking wasn't any worse than caffeine use, I'm sure there would be hundreds of members here also jumping in to correct that mistaken statement.

Because long-term use of NRT products has been discouraged and drug companies are not allowed to promote it as THR, there is very, very little research done on the long-term health risks of tobacco-free nicotine. I would bet that 99.9% of the research quoted about the health risks of "nicotine" and "tobacco" are actually the results of research on smoking health effects. The ANTZ are quite happy to interchange the words "nicotine addiction" and "tobacco" for the word "smoking" whether it is scientifically accurate or not.

 

[Stinknugget]

I am interested in this subject simply for the fact i am trying to rid myself of all reasonable toxins my body doesn't need. Am i going to walk around with a mask like you see on the news in China? No. But by the time i am 35 i would like to say i am free from the dependency of nicotine, caffiene, and children. Ok, well two out of three aint bad.

What is needed here is an unbiased study by both medical professionals and chemists alike and i hate to be a realist but we need it soon.

Let's not forget, less than a lifetime ago cigarettes were safe and in a number of instances considered beneficial to ones health.

We also believed the world was flat.

We also believed Bush won legally in 2k. (Well, lets not get carried away)

My point is...lets not conclude that something is completely "safe" until individuals well versed in it's research have there say. No one knows the long term effects vaping has on the body.

Granted, nothing worth anything in life comes without an adherent risk. So live it up, Just live it up with your eyes and ears open.

 

[DC2]

You'd have to be a fool to believe that the mass intake of a known toxin has no negative effects.

Drink too much water, and you WILL die.
Eat too much salt, and you WILL die.

The list goes on and on. In fact, that particular list never ends.

Mass intake of anything will harm you, and eventually kill you.
There is absolutely no reason to single nicotine out as if it was something special.

Luckily, the amount of nicotine we receive would not be considered "mass intake".
At least not by me, and not by the opinion of most doctors I have read.

 

[DC2]

Because long-term use of NRT products has been discouraged and drug companies are not allowed to promote it as THR, there is very, very little research done on the long-term health risks of tobacco-free nicotine. I would bet that 99.9% of the research quoted about the health risks of "nicotine" and "tobacco" are actually the results of research on smoking health effects. The ANTZ are quite happy to interchange the words "nicotine addiction" and "tobacco" for the word "smoking" whether it is scientifically accurate or not.

Well, now that Big Pharma wants to get nicotine (NRT) treatments approved for long-term use, we'll probably start seeing more studies on nicotine.
Although this situation will present quite a challenge for the "health advocate" groups, because they would have to change their tunes.

 

[kristin]

My point is...lets not conclude that something is completely "safe" until individuals well versed in it's research have there say. No one knows the long term effects vaping has on the body.

I think this is where a lot of people misunderstand what is being said when claims about nicotine are challenged. We don't claim that nicotine or vaping is "completely safe." We acknowledge that there are most likely health risks, just as there are with any other product we put into our bodies - even things that are CONSIDERED perfectly safe for the majority of people.

Some people interpret counter arguments to many of the negative health claims posted as "fandom" and dismissal of even the possibility of health risks and that is not the case. It is undeniable that there are health risks for some people. We only wish to have the truth known about junk science or misinterpreted research and for people to use reason and perspective on the actual health risks that may exist.

 

[Stinknugget]

I think this is where a lot of people misunderstand what is being said when claims about nicotine are challenged. We don't claim that nicotine or vaping is "completely safe." We acknowledge that there are most likely health risks, just as there are with any other product we put into our bodies - even things that are CONSIDERED perfectly safe for the majority of people.

Some people interpret counter arguments to many of the negative health claims posted as "fandom" and dismissal of even the possibility of health risks and that is not the case. It is undeniable that there are health risks for some people. We only wish to have the truth known about junk science or misinterpreted research and for people to use reason and perspective on the actual health risks that may exist.

I should have been more specific when using the word "we".

I wasn't refering to anyone reading this thread looking for information regarding nicotine absorbtion. These indivuduals are already in the right state of mind as if they are reading this thread they obviously understand the dangers associated with nicotine and are doing there own research.

I was refering to the uninitiated. For example, The kiosks in the malls sell the ecig as if it was an fda approved smoking cessation device to which people respond very well to. I have seen too many ads online with either a direct statement that the ecig is 100% safe or an implication that makes the undereducated believe there is not risk involved.

 

[kristin]

Well, now that Big Pharma wants to get nicotine (NRT) treatments approved for long-term use, we'll probably start seeing more studies on nicotine.
Although this situation will present quite a challenge for the "health advocate" groups, because they would have to change their tunes.

They will most definitely have a difficult time with the ANTZ, because "addiction" has been demonized in our society, regardless of the health risks of the addiction.

Ironically, it's "bad" to be "addicted" upon a nicotine habit that makes you "feel better," yet it's ok to be "dependent" upon pharmaceuticals which essentially achieve the same result. Ironically, smoke-free nicotine use has far fewer health risks and side effects than many of those approved pharmaceuticals. My choice is that I could keep enjoying vaping nicotine until I die, with few risks and minor side effects and remain a pariah in society, or take Zoloft, with the full blessing of society and run the risk of suffering nausea, insomnia, dizziness, dry mouth (same as vaping), fatigue, drowsiness, indigestion, shakiness, loss of appetite, decreased sex drive, headaches, sweating, numbness, abdominal pain, constipation, vision changes, hot flashes, nervousness (isn't it supposed to treat that??), suicidal thoughts or behavior, anxiety, agitation, panic attacks (again - isn't this the treatment for those?), engaging in unusual or dangerous behavior, become hostile or aggressive, suffer serotonin syndrom (which has all sorts of deadly effects), chest palpitations, restlessness, jitteriness, glaucoma, high blood pressure, hair loss, seizures, tinnitus, acne, weight gain or loss...it still goes on.

The idea that people who use nicotine will be fine once they quit or won't become dependent on something else is naive and completely hypocritical. I'm sure there are many people who swap a nicotine habit for exercise and proper diet and live happily ever after - but how many are badgered into quitting and end up putting something far worse into their bodies?

 

[Black Strat]

Shoganinja:
Don't forget to include the therapeutic section of the Wiki article you quoted, as well as the overlooked statement that there are no epidemiological studies showing nicotine as a stand alone causes cancer. Picking and choosing to support an argument only marginalizes one's position.

 

[DC2]

So you say that the first link I grabbed off of a gigantic google search wasn't "hard science" and then you link some silly blog?

Silly blog?

That blog entry is by Dr. Brad Rodu...
https://louisville.edu/bucksforbrains/faculty/rodu

Brad Rodu

Endowed Chair in Tobacco Harm Reduction Research
School of Medicine

Brad Rodu has been appointed the first holder of the Endowed Chair in Tobacco Harm Reduction Research at the University of Louisville’s James Graham Brown Cancer Center.

His research focuses on the substitution of safer tobacco products by smokers who are unable or unwilling to quit smoking with conventional cessation methods because of their addiction to nicotine. His research in comparative epidemiology established the scientific foundation for harm reduction and he continues to study clinical and social interventions aimed at harm reduction.

Tobacco harm reduction has been popular among Swedish men, who have the lowest smoking rate and highest smokeless tobacco usage rate in Europe. In a study published in the Journal of Internal Medicine, Rodu found that smokeless tobacco products were primarily responsible for a decline in smoking among Swedish men from 23 percent in 1986 to 14 percent in 1999.

Rodu has published a book summarizing his research, as well as several book chapters and more than 150 articles and abstracts in peer-reviewed journals. He has been principal investigator for numerous clinical trials and extramurally-funded studies.

Prior to joining U of L in 2005, Rodu served on the faculty of the University of Alabama at Birmingham, where most of his research was conducted.

Rodu earned his D.D.S. at the Ohio State University, completed a residency in oral pathology at Emory University in Atlanta, and was awarded NCI and ACS fellowships at UAB.

I'd say he's qualified to discuss the subject.

 

[MickeyRat]

If nothing shows up then you'll know it's safe then, won't you? I am pretty sure it can detect smaller increments. It's made to detect the nicotine in your juice and anything less than say 4mg is pretty negligible for an adult, especially after vaping.

About your other comment, I am going to disagree. At least you don't know what the heck is going on when you have alzheimer's (there are other ways to help prevent that too btw) and it doesn't kill you. If you die of pancreatic cancer you're going to know all about it. My grandma has alzheimer's (and COPD with an oxygen tank strapped to her wheelchair). She thinks it's many decades ago and that her husband is still alive and they are in love. She's in a state of bliss, oblivious to the fact that she lives basically alone (since she doesn't socialize) in a nursing home and none of her offspring ever visit her. Fortunately, we are allowed to take her out of there for family events. She smoked 2 packs of Salems a day, for the record.

Do you know anything at all about chemistry? The nicotine test kits are titration kits. They are accurate within a few percent but, they aren't going to detect nicotine in parts per million and that's what you're going to get by blowing vapor in a plastic bag and mixing it with water.

Funny my step-brother died at 52 from Alzheimer's. I guess someone should have told him it wasn't a fatal disease.

 

[Vocalek]

So you say that the first link I grabbed off of a gigantic google search wasn't "hard science" and then you link some silly blog?

A simple search on Wikipedia reveals the following:

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).

And by the way there are many "hard science" citations in this article. Perhaps you should read that?

You'd have to be a fool to believe that the mass intake of a known toxin has no negative effects.

A search of PubMed (online database for the National Library of Medicine) using Rodu=Author came back with 96 results. rodu - PubMed - NCBI[Author]

He is a scientist who conducts research and whenever his blog discusses a scientific point, he provides a link to the abstract or to the full article if available. I highly recommend reading this article in its entirety: The scientific foundation for tobacco harm reduction, 2006-2011

Many people will never be able to give up nicotine, if they are using its beneficial effects to self-medicate underlying conditions. Kristin has already discussed the fact that choosing to be treated for depression with a pharmaceutical product carries some serious potential side-effects. Further more, only 30% of the people treated with a pharmaceutical product are free of depressive symptoms. You can look up the side-effects listed for any pharmaceutical nicotine product and compare them to the potential side effects of medications used to treat attention deficit disorder.

Scientific research has many levels. The starting point for scientific questions is often at the cellular level with in vitrio studies, which help researchers forumulate a hypothesis. Animal studies can help to refine, support, or refute these hypotheses.. Clinical trials on humans can provide more pertinent information, because sometimes what is seen happening at the cellular level and/or in animal studies leads to a hypothesis that is not borne out in human studies. Finally, the acid test where sceintific questions are concerned is epidemiology -- studies on large populations. None of the mechamisms that have been hypothesized for nicotine causing cancer have not been borne out in the epidemiology. Rolygate has already addressed this, and the references in the article on the scientific basis for tobacco harm reduction cite these studies, so I won't reproduce them here.

Might my intake of nicoitne have some negative effects? Quite possibly. But I have to balance these potential negative effects with combatting severe depression, anxiety, inability to concentrate, memory loss -- all of which hit me like a ton of bricks when I became totally abstinent from nicoitne. I have been able to reduce the amount of nicotine I take in by using some of the prescription medications avaialble for these conditions, but I have had to discontinue some of these due to adverse reactions. One example is a severe tremor that made it difficult for me to even type and impossible for me to hand-write.

So each person has to take their own situation into account and make their own decisions. I know you believe that you know what is best for everyone else. But we are not all identical. You need to entertatin the hypothesis that what works best for you might not work well at all for another person whose body chemistry and physiology differs from yours.

 

[ShogaNinja]

Drink too much water, and you WILL die.
Eat too much salt, and you WILL die.

The list goes on and on. In fact, that particular list never ends.

Mass intake of anything will harm you, and eventually kill you.
There is absolutely no reason to single nicotine out as if it was something special.

Luckily, the amount of nicotine we receive would not be considered "mass intake".
At least not by me, and not by the opinion of most doctors I have read.

A doctor's opinion is just that. They don't go to school to study that stuff. Did you ever ask yourself why they leave the room and come back? It's not just to see other patients it's to jump on the internet real quick and try to diagnose you. Then they come back and say "it's probably this... we'll give you this to TRY (because we're paid to) and we'll check your progress (i.e. try again) in a couple weeks." Doctoring is not a science it's a probabilities game. I've worked with doctors and some of them are borderline idiots with expensive educations and thier drug choices are made mostly for the money. What you need is a scientist. Scientists use empirical evidence to prove their theories 100% every time. If you throw a ball in the air, due to the gravitational forces affecting its mass it will fall at exactly the same rate every time. Due to the highly variable nature of substances on the human population a doctor can never really say that what he does is science. It's just guesswork based on probability. But it works both ways. If they don't know then they recommend against it and that is probably the case here. After all, do no harm. Nicotine contains tobacco-specific nitrosamines are known to be carcinogens. The reason they overdose rats on stuff like nicotine is to speed up the process. If that process occurs quickly, it will occur slowly as well. Whether or not it will happen within a human lifetime is the question.

A thimbleful of nicotine (60mg for the average adult) can kill you. That's reason enough to single it out. A thimbleful of water or salt will not kill you. Mass intake in this case is measured in milligrams. Also, LONG TERM intake is bad. The sun gives you vitamin D, a vitamin not found significantly in any food source, yet if you sit in it for say an hour a day for your entire life your chances of skin cancer are dramatically increased. If nicotine were good for you then the pulmonologists, who are ecstatic that you've traded smoking for a lesser evil, would be recommending that non-smokers and even children start vaping. If it were good for you it'd be in your multivitamin. Your argument doesn't hold water. Nicotine is a toxin, period. It's BAD for you. To say otherwise is gross negligence. You will see doctors endorse vaping over smoking but you will never see a doctor endorse vaping to a non-smoker. It's called Nicotine Reduction Therapy for a reason. To reduce the nicotine dependency. If you want to take your life into your own hands that's on you, but don't argue for an unhealthy habit. It is after all the reason we are all here, to quit smoking, and to prevent cancer if possible. If for some reason I turn out to be completely wrong, and logic dictates otherwise, then I'll eat my words, but there is still something to be said about a physical dependency and the wages it takes on your psyche. Freedom from dependency should be everyone here's ultimate goal. There is also something to be said about children getting their hands into your e-cig stash and the dangers that represents. There's a reason why when you get a bottle of unflavored nicotine solution that it says Danger: Poison Toxic if swallowed or absorbed through skin. May cause irritation to skin, eyes, and respiratory tract. Wash thoroughly after handling. For laboratory use only. Keep away from children. Health Hazard: Severe. Wear protective equipment. All right next to a hazardous material sign.

In my opinion it is ludicrous to you compare that to water or salt and say that it shouldn't be singled out. With all that has been said and all that we know about it being a poison, the err is on the side of safety. No one here is going to submit empirical evidence that it can have detrimental health effects so let's err on the side of caution. If anything taken in excess has harmful consequences it bears to reason that so to does nicotine. Until indisputable proof comes out that states otherwise, THAT is the mindset we should all have.

 

[ShogaNinja]

A search of PubMed (online database for the National Library of Medicine) using Rodu=Author came back with 96 results. rodu - PubMed - NCBI[Author]

He is a scientist who conducts research and whenever his blog discusses a scientific point, he provides a link to the abstract or to the full article if available. I highly recommend reading this article in its entirety: The scientific foundation for tobacco harm reduction, 2006-2011

Many people will never be able to give up nicotine, if they are using its beneficial effects to self-medicate underlying conditions. Kristin has already discussed the fact that choosing to be treated for depression with a pharmaceutical product carries some serious potential side-effects. Further more, only 30% of the people treated with a pharmaceutical product are free of depressive symptoms. You can look up the side-effects listed for any pharmaceutical nicotine product and compare them to the potential side effects of medications used to treat attention deficit disorder.

Scientific research has many levels. The starting point for scientific questions is often at the cellular level with in vitrio studies, which help researchers forumulate a hypothesis. Animal studies can help to refine, support, or refute these hypotheses.. Clinical trials on humans can provide more pertinent information, because sometimes what is seen happening at the cellular level and/or in animal studies leads to a hypothesis that is not borne out in human studies. Finally, the acid test where sceintific questions are concerned is epidemiology -- studies on large populations. None of the mechamisms that have been hypothesized for nicotine causing cancer have not been borne out in the epidemiology. Rolygate has already addressed this, and the references in the article on the scientific basis for tobacco harm reduction cite these studies, so I won't reproduce them here.

Might my intake of nicoitne have some negative effects? Quite possibly. But I have to balance these potential negative effects with combatting severe depression, anxiety, inability to concentrate, memory loss -- all of which hit me like a ton of bricks when I became totally abstinent from nicoitne. I have been able to reduce the amount of nicotine I take in by using some of the prescription medications avaialble for these conditions, but I have had to discontinue some of these due to adverse reactions. One example is a severe tremor that made it difficult for me to even type and impossible for me to hand-write.

So each person has to take their own situation into account and make their own decisions. I know you believe that you know what is best for everyone else. But we are not all identical. You need to entertatin the hypothesis that what works best for you might not work well at all for another person whose body chemistry and physiology differs from yours.

Tobacco Harm Reduction. Not harm elimination, reduction. I am talking about elimination outside of the damage that has already been done.

All of these negative effects you speak of are temporary. I am of the mind that one should not use a permanent solution to a temporary problem. I am not here to tell everyone that they must stop vaping their nicotine. I am glad everyone here quit smoking. What I AM here to do is to combat this concept that it's healthy and totally ok for people to vape with nicotine their entire lives and that nothing will happen. Let the people make their own choice, but let them do it with a full deck, not one that's stacked to make them think that what they are doing is somehow considered "healthy". I want people to know that the journey doesn't end with switching to vaping, which by the way, for me was the easiest thing I ever did. I feel like I never quit. Is it an accomplishment that I quit smoking? Sure. Was it monumentally difficult, a la quitting cold turkey? Not even close.

If humans needed nicotine we would crave to eat tobacco. We do not. In fact eating tobacco often makes the person turn green and projectile vomit. This is a sure sign that it is poisonous to the human body alone. I realize that nicotine is found in cauliflower, green tomatoes, eggplants and potatoes, but I can also point out many many cultures that don't have access to these foods. Because this toxin is hidden deep inside nutritious food our bodies are tricked to accept it. There are pesticides in all these food too which quit assuredly poisonous and yet we munch on. Humans do not need nicotine to survive. The only reason they ever get addicted to it is because of tobacco use. Just because that has stopped does not mean that our mission to be smoke free must stop with the smoking cessation. Nicotine can kill you, especially if you have had cancer already. My mom is battling breast cancer (for the second time) as we speak. I said you should try an ecigarette and quit smoking like me. She said "smoking didn't cause my breast cancer to come back". It's these kinds of misconceptions that I am here to counteract.

 

[ShogaNinja]

Actually, because most people get it when they are elderly it never occurred to me to think that it could be fatal but I guess come to find out it is in 70% of the people diagnosed with the disease. I never knew. I am sorry to hear about your loss.

No I am not a scientist, or a chemist. I never claimed to be an expert in any of these fields. I came up with an idea of how one could test it that could lay people's concerns to rest. Anything less than a mg is insignificant indeed, and as another poster said, a kid can get that in a nice vegetable puree in a baby food jar. Once again, not that I condone vaping around children for psychological reasons if nothing else.

The idea here is to get people talking and thinking. It is when we get complacent that trouble brews. We are all here to learn.

 

[ShogaNinja]

Shoganinja:
Don't forget to include the therapeutic section of the Wiki article you quoted, as well as the overlooked statement that there are no epidemiological studies showing nicotine as a stand alone causes cancer. Picking and choosing to support an argument only marginalizes one's position.

Tobacco-specific nitrosamines - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Keep reading.

 

[Spazmelda]

Fun word problem:

Eggplants contain The most nicotine of any vegetable. Eggplants contain about 100 nanograms of nicotine per gram of vegetable. How much eggplant would a baby have to eat to get 1 mg of nicotine?

Also NRT stands for nicotine replacement therapy, not reduction.

There are a lot of things in your posts that are not correct or not quite logically thought out. I am too tired to go through them right now. Maybe tomorrow.

For what it's worth, I don't usually see people on here claiming that vaping nicotine is Guaranteed to be 100% safe. There is usually a qualifier to make it clear that it's probably safer than smoking, but not completely risk free.

ETA: I haven't had air conditioning for 5 days, so I'm a little grumpier than usual today.

 

[MickeyRat]

Guys lets quit feeding the troll. It's been a while but, they've been here before.