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November 10th, 2016:

Forget the FDA: Electronic Cigarettes Face an Even More Hazardous Risk

http://www.foxbusiness.com/markets/2016/11/10/forget-fda-electronic-cigarettes-face-even-more-hazardous-risk.html

As if the FDA’s new “deeming regulations Opens a New Window. ” weren’t going to cause enough damage to the electronic-cigarette industry, there’s apparently a new risk associated with the smoking alternative that could burn their manufacturers. According to reports, e-cigs seem to have a penchant for exploding, causing burns and injuries to their users.

E-cigs have been on fire

Electronic cigarettes have enjoyed explosive growth. Since 2012, the Tobacco Merchants Association says sales quadrupled to $2 billion in 2015,and Wells Fargo expects them to hit $4 billion this year. Yet the industry could be in for a substantial decline.

The new regulations treat e-cigs and vapor products just the same as combustible cigarettes, even though they contain no tobacco. Most devices are powered by a battery that heats a liquid nicotine solution to create a vapor, not smoke, that is then inhaled. Tobacco itself isn’t burned, and that’s where the vast majority of toxic chemicals associated with smoking are created.

Even with the next generation of e-cigs being developed that do use tobacco, it’s only being used for flavor. Both the Marlboro-Brand Heat Sticks from Philip Morris International(NYSE: PM)and British American Tobacco’s (NYSEMKT: BTI) new iFuse heat up a liquid to create a vapor, which is then drawn through real tobacco Opens a New Window. to give it the taste smokers have been looking for.

A heavy burden on the industry

All of the above is of no consequence to the FDA, which treats e-cigs just like regular cigarettes anyway.The regulations will be so onerous and costly, that it’s expected only the largest tobacco companies will be able to comply. Even by the agency’s own estimates, it will cost e-cig manufacturers several hundred thousands of dollars per product and take 5,000 hours to comply. Third-party estimates, however, put the cost closer to $3 million to $20 million per product.

Additionally e-cig makers have to register with the FDA, after which the regulatory agency will begin a two-year review of their products and determine those that will be allowed to survive and which ones will be banned. Vape store owners expect that within two years, the industry will be destroyed.

While there was a rush by manufacturers to get new products onto the market before the changes went into effect, it’s still expected that whatever growth the industry might have enjoyed will eventually be wiped out by strict regulations.

A burning question on safety

But the industry has a more immediate problem to contend with. It appears the lithium-ion batteries used to power these devices have the potential to explode.

Earlier this year there was a spate of news stories reporting incidents of e-cig users who were injured by exploding batteries. Although the Tobacco Vapor Electronic Cigarette Association admits such incidents can happen, it maintains their occurrence is rare and preventable: Only use the chargers that come with the device, and don’t put them in your pocket, since coins can cause short-circuiting.

It’s a well-documented phenomenon that other devices such as laptops and cellphones that use lithium-ion batteries to power them are also susceptible to fire and explosions. Most U.S. airlines ended up banning the batteries as cargo on passenger flights because of the risks associated with them, and the U.S. Postal Service banned hover boards from being shipped by airplane because their batteries reportedly overheated and caused fires.

Most recently, Samsung just stopped production on and recalled every single Galaxy Note 7 smartphone manufactured — some 1 million total — because of numerous reports they caught fire while charging.

“Flaming rocket” behavior

Electronic cigarettes, however, may have a greater propensity for combustibility. The U.S. Fire Administration says the shape and design of electronic cigarettes “make them more likely than other products with lithium-ion batteries to behave like ‘flaming rockets’ when a battery fails.”

The culprit seems to be the lithium-ion batteries that can overheat, catch fire, or even explode, resulting in injury or death. Image source: Getty Images.

And because of their prevalence, such incidents are happening more frequently. Between October 2015 and June 2016, the University of Washington Medical Center in Seattle treated 15 patients for injuries from exploding e-cigarettes. In comparison, during the five-year period between 2009 and 2014, it treated just 25 such injuries.

According to a comprehensive list Opens a New Window. of incidents compiled by industry site eCig One, there have been at least 193 explosions reported since 2009, of which 121, or 62%,have resulted in injury or death.

While that still means e-cig explosions remain few and far between — considering the millions of people using them on a daily basis, the relative handful of incidents is small — it’s a problem the industry doesn’t need.

A social pariah

Electronic cigarettes and personal vaping devices are increasingly being treated like cigarettes in social settings, with users being banned from vaping in public places just like tobacco users, or relegated to segregated areas. And not just in the U.S., but in Europe and Asia, too, the regulations are becoming more strict. The Philippines just enacted a complete ban Opens a New Window. on smoking in public, one that includes e-cigs.

Because of concerns about quality and taste (hence the reason Philip Morris and British American use real tobacco for flavor), the growth trajectory of the devices has already declined significantly. After years of triple-digit growth, e-cig sales fell 6% in the first quarter of 2016.

If exploding e-cigs become any more of a phenomenon, that could stub out any chance of survival for the industry, even before the FDA regulations have an opportunity to wreak havoc.

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Hazardous chemicals discovered in flavored e-cigarette vapor

http://phys.org/news/2016-11-hazardous-chemicals-flavored-e-cigarette-vapor.html

Building on more than 30 years of air quality research in some of the most polluted urban environments on Earth, a team of atmospheric scientists at the Desert Research Institute (DRI) have turned their attention toward the growing e-cigarette industry and the unidentified effects of vaping on human health.

New research published this week in Environmental Science & Technology, a journal of the American Chemical Society, reports that the aerosols (commonly called vapors) produced by flavored e-cigarettes liquids contain dangerous levels of hazardous chemicals known to cause cancer in humans.

The study “Flavoring compounds dominate toxic aldehyde production during e-cigarette vaping” confirms that these toxic aldehydes, such as formaldehyde, are formed not by evaporation, but rather during the chemical breakdown of the flavored e-liquid during the rapid heating process (pyrolysis) that occurs inside e-cigarettes or electronic nicotine delivery systems (ENDS).

“How these flavoring compounds in e-cigarette liquids affect the chemical composition and toxicity of the vapor that e-cigarettes produce is practically unknown,”

explained Andrey Khylstov, Ph.D., an associate research professor of atmospheric sciences at DRI. “Our results show that production of toxic aldehydes is exponentially dependent on the concentration of flavoring compounds.”

E-cigarette liquids have been marketed in nearly 8,000 different flavors, according to a 2014 report from the World Health Organization. Recent reports have shown that many flavors, such as Gummy Bear, Tutti Fruitty, Bubble Gum, etc., were found to be especially appealing to adolescents and young adults.

The U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) reports that 16-percent of high school and 5.3-percent of middle school students were current users of e-cigarettes in 2015, making e-cigarettes the most commonly used tobacco product among youth for the second consecutive year. In 2014, 12.6-percent of U.S. adults had ever tried an e-cigarette, and about 3.7-percent of adults used e-cigarettes daily or some days.

Khylstov and his colleagues measured concentrations of 12 aldehydes in aerosols produced by three common e-cigarette devices. To determine whether the flavoring additives affected aldehyde production during vaping, five flavored e-liquids were tested in each device. In addition, two unflavored e-liquids were also tested.

“To determine the specific role of the flavoring compounds we fixed all important parameters that could affect aldehyde production and varied only the type and concentration of flavors,” explained Vera Samburova, Ph.D., an assistant research professor of chemistry at DRI.

Samburova added that the devices used in the study represented three of the most common types of e-cigarettes – bottom and top coil clearomizers, and a cartomizer.

The study avoided any variation in puff topography (e.g., puff volume, puff velocity, interval between puffs) by utilizing a controlled sampling system that simulated the most common vaping conditions. E-cigarette vapor was produced from each device by a four-second, 40-ml controlled puff, with 30-second resting periods between puffs.

The e-cigarette devices were manually operated to replicate real-life conditions and all samples were collected in triplicate to verify and confirm results. Specific care was taken to avoid “dry puff” conditions.

To provide further proof that the flavoring compounds, not the carrier e-liquid solvents (most commonly propylene glycol and/or vegetable glycerin) dominated production of aldehydes during vaping, the authors performed a series of experiments in which a test flavored e-liquid was diluted with different amounts of the unflavored e-liquid. Liquids with higher flavor content produced larger amounts of aldehydes due to pyrolysis of the flavoring compounds.

In all experiments, the amount of aldehydes produced by the flavored e-cigarette liquids exceeded the American Conference of Governmental Industrial Hygienists Threshold Limit Values (TLVs) for hazardous chemical exposure.

“One puff of any of the flavored e-liquids that we tested exposes the smoker to unacceptably dangerous levels of these aldehydes, most of which originates from thermal decomposition of the flavoring compounds,” said Khylstov. “These results demonstrate the need for further, thorough investigations of the effects of flavoring additives on the formation of aldehydes and other toxic compounds in e-cigarette vapors.”

Mike Pence, the US Vice President-elect, has said he doesn’t believe that smoking kills

http://www.businessinsider.com.au/mike-pence-smoking-doesnt-kill-2016-11?r=UK&IR=T

Mike Pence, the Vice President-elect of the United States, has said that he doesn’t believe smoking kills people.

At least that’s what he wrote in an op-ed published in 2000. And he’s made no public effort to update his position since.

“Time for a quick reality check,” Pence wrote. “Despite the hysteria from the political class and the media, smoking doesn’t kill. In fact, 2 out of every three smokers does not die from a smoking related illness and 9 out of ten smokers do not contract lung cancer.”

Pence’s statistics are questionable to the point of being ludicrous, largely because we keep discovering new ways that smoking is deadly. Even so, his own statistics are worrisome. About 40 million people smoke in the US according to the CDC. One out of every three current smokers dying from a smoking-related illness would translate to about 13.3 million people dead. One out of ten smokers developing lung cancer mean 4 million sick people.

Here are the facts

  • Smoking kills 480,000 people every year and shortens the life of an average user by a decade.
  • That makes it the leading cause of preventable death in the US.
  • The pain is felt particularly sharply in poor communities. A full 26.3% of people who live below the poverty level smoke.
  • Encouraging people to quit smoking is a public health priority. Smokers who quit before turning 40 can begin to turn around their risks of early death.

Pence adds “news flash: smoking is not good for you,” which further raises the question of why he felt the need to write a piece in the first place downplaying tobacco’s dangers.

To be clear: The year 2000 was a while ago, but it also came 36 years after Surgeon General Luther Terry published his 1964 reports on the link between smoking and cancer.

Mike Pence was selected to be a stable, mainstream companion to President-elect Donald Trump, and to settle the nerves of the Republican party — apparently despite the then-candidate’s expressed wishes. Now he’s just one of the many reasons people who care about science and health are terrified of the impending presidency.

Tobacco linked to 40 percent of all cancers diagnosed in U.S.

http://www.wilx.com/content/news/Tobacco-Cancer-Link-400772071.html

The number of people who smoke has fallen significantly, but tobacco use remains a factor in a large percentage of cancers.

A new report from the Centers for Disease Control links tobacco to 40-percent of all cancers diagnosed in the U.S.

Smoking doesn’t just cause lung cancer. It’s also linked to cancers of the mouth and throat, voice box, esophagus, stomach, kidney,

colon, bladder and even a form of leukemia.

C.D.C. data also shows fewer Americans are smoking. About 20-percent of adults smoked in 2005.

That number fell to 15-percent last year.

SCORECARD LAUNCHED ON FCTC IMPLEMENTATION IN THE ASEAN REGION

Singapore leads the way in a 10-country race in the ASEAN to protect public health from the harms of tobacco use according to the Framework Convention on Tobacco Control (FCTC) Scorecard launched by the Southeast Asia Tobacco Control Alliance (SEATCA).

In a region where nearly half of all adult men smoke and where 10% (125 million) of the world’s smokers live, it is indeed a race to reverse the smoking epidemic and its devastating impacts that claims about 500,000 deaths every year.

“The scorecard acknowledges achievements and progressive efforts of ASEAN governments while also identifying implementation gaps that need further action. It also encourages comparisons between countries to further motivate the strengthening of FCTC implementation. Overall, there is significant room for further progress,” said Dr. Ulysses Dorotheo, SEATCA FCTC Program Director.

Over-all, Singapore scored the highest (80.5%), followed by Brunei (71.2%) and Thailand (67.1%). Two key areas for improvement are in policies on tobacco taxation and protecting health policies from tobacco industry interference.

While raising tobacco taxes is recognized as among the most effective means of reducing consumption, this measure is the least well implemented among ASEAN countries. The region’s most expensive cigarettes are found in Brunei and Singapore, but cigarettes are still generally very affordable in all countries.

Most countries are experiencing tobacco industry interference and do not have a FCTC Article 5.3 policy or code of conduct to address this problem. Only Singapore has a FCTC Article 5.3 policy or code of conduct that is enforced by the whole government, while the Philippines has a FCTC Article 5.3 policy or code of conduct that applies to the whole government but needs improved enforcement.

Enforcement of smoke-free policies needs to be strengthened further to achieve the full health benefits of such policies. All countries restrict or ban smoking in many settings, but only Brunei enforces a smoking ban in all indoor workplaces, indoor public places, and public transport, as well as some outdoor public places.

While standardized packaging of tobacco or ‘plain packaging’ is widely regarded as the best way to package tobacco, no ASEAN country has yet implemented this measure.

All countries, however, require pictorial health warnings on packages, although some require them only for cigarettes and not for other (e.g. smokeless) tobacco products.

Thailand leads with the largest pictorial health warnings (85% front and back).

All ASEAN countries except Indonesia, a non-party to the FCTC, enforce a complete ban on tobacco advertising in print media, TV, radio, and cinema. Regrettably, only half of the ASEAN countries (Brunei, Malaysia, Singapore, Thailand, and Vietnam) enforce a ban on tobacco advertising at points of sale (POS).

The scorecard is available at www.seatca.org.

THE UNION’S INDEX OF TOBACCO CONTROL SUSTAINABILITY

The Index of Tobacco Control Sustainability (ITCS) is a new tool to assess and guide national tobacco control programmes and systems to become sustainable. It was developed to work for countries across the economic spectrum, using 31 indicators to identify whether the vital structures, policies and resources for sustainable national tobacco control programmes are present or absent. Through the ITCS’ comprehensive and holistic assessment, countries can draw out the information needed to strengthen and sustain their tobacco control systems. Importantly, the ITCS identifies infrastructural gaps as well as areas of strength.

After the ITCS was published in British Medical Journal Tobacco Control, it was piloted in 24 countries with the highest burden of tobacco use —an ITCS assessment was completed in each. The greater the number of indicators a country has in place, the greater its ITCS score. The higher a country’s total score the more likely it is to have a sustainable tobacco control programme. The greatest possible score is 130. Because MPOWER encompasses the key evidencebased strategies needed to reduce tobacco use, it is the most important factor for sustainable tobacco control.

Without at least four MPOWER policies in place a country cannot be sustainable, regardless of its score.

One possible limitation of the ITCS is that it identifies the presence or absence of key components for sustainable tobacco control —it does not assess quality. The rationale for this binary rating system: present or absent, is strong. It places emphasis on ensuring that the foundations for critical components are in place, and clearly identifies infrastructural gaps.

It also enables assessment across vastly varied countries.

If a component is pending at the moment of assessment, it is designated as absent. So an ITCS assessment should be viewed as a ‘snapshot in time’, capturing a moment in an evolving situation.

An ITCS assessment is only the start of the process; it sets a baseline from which the critical work can begin —to address the system gaps identified. Multiple assessments conducted over a number of years can track development.

FINDINGS OF THE 24 COUNTRY ASSESSMENTS:

Two countries achieved the ‘threshold’ of sustainability, and Vietnam is very close to this level.

All three are low0- and middleincome economies. This illustrates that financial resources may not be the sole, or even the primary factor, for sustainable tobacco control.

Several areas stand out as requiring action by many countries:

Critical measures for preventing tobacco industry interference were absent in many cases: no country has a WHO FCTC Article 5.3 policy covering all government  departments and few ban tobacco industry corporate social responsibility programmes. These gaps should be addressed as a priority, to ensure investments in tobacco control are not undermined.

Many countries had one of the two tax indicators, but few had both.

One is a good foundation, but with both tax policies in place, this most effective measure for reducing tobacco consumption will have assured long-term impact.

Other factors requiring action include: earmarking a national tobacco control budget; developing health promotion funds or similar; official involvement of civil society within national tobacco control committees; and prioritising capacity-building.

The ITCS was developed at the start of The Union’s second decade working in international tobacco control. As a partner in the Bloomberg Initiative to Reduce Tobacco Use we work with governments and civil society in low and middle income countries to help introduce and implement policies proven to reduce tobacco use. The ITCS is the work of Dr Angela Jackson-Morris and Dr Ehsan Latif of The Union’s Department of Tobacco Control.

Access the ITCS & 24 Country Assessments at www.tobaccofreeunion.org

Contact Dr Jackson-Morris ajackson-morris@theunion.org for more information on completing an assessment.

FOOD SECURITY, OR TOBACCO ONLY?

In 2012, the G8 initiated a development programme intended to lift 50 million people out of poverty until 2022. The New Alliance for Food Security and Nutrition (NAFSN) is implemented in 10 countries in sub-Saharan Africa and uses a multi-stakeholder approach strongly involving the private sector.

From the beginning, the initiative has been closely monitored by civil society organisations worldwide, which have identified several issues with the NAFSN. Governments are forced to implement reforms in order to gain increased investment through the programme. The liberalisation of farmland opens the door to land grabbing, leaving smallholder farmers without their most important means of production.

As a result, the NAFSN favours big agribusiness over smallholder farmers, who produce more than 70 percent of the world’s food. In this light, the programme is not consistent with the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development and its 17 Goals.

Malawi is a densely populated country with 35.8 percent of its population undernourished. At the same time, the country is highly dependent on tobacco exports, which generate roughly 50 percent of the total export revenues. Malawi is the world’s top exporter of Burley tobacco and not a Party to the FCTC.

Under the European Union, the NAFSN in Malawi includes, on the pretext of improved food security, an increase in tobacco growing in terms both of yield per hectare and in area cultivated. Furthermore, the programme co-operates with subsidiaries of the world’s leading two leaf tobacco merchants: Alliance One Malawi (AOM) and Limbe Leaf Tobacco Company (LLTC).

According to the 2014 progress report, AOM seeks, inter alia, to increase the production of flue-cured Virginia tobacco six-fold and to nearly double Burley tobacco production. Additionally, the company plans to triple its area under cultivation, for tobacco as well as for maize and soya.

LLTC basically intends to further the transformation of the tobacco growing sector in Malawi from the auction system to the integrated production system. By directly contracting farmers, the company gains control over the whole production cycle and is able to exert its power when it comes to grade leaf tobacco and to set prices.

Another company, Mpatsa Farms Ltd., planned to venture into fish farming and rice cultivation, cotton, soya and maize. In 2014, the company acknowledged it gave up those plans instead channelling resources to tobacco growing “due to preferential prices”.

Thus, the NAFSN has reinforced Malawi’s dependence on tobacco exports. It endangers food security and increases poverty among smallholder and tenant farmers.

Even the former Special Rapporteur on the Right to Food, Olivier De Schutter, reported the extremely precarious conditions of tobacco tenants in Malawi after his visit in 2013.

Apart from threatening food security, instead of furthering it, the participation of tobacco companies in NAFSN is used by tobacco industry-funded front groups like the International Tobacco Growers’ Association (ITGA) to promote their crop. Newly elected ITGA vice president Reuben Maigwa, from Malawi, even claimed the industry’s integrated production system would lead to sustainable tobacco growing and food security.

In a country where one-third of the population is undernourished, it is absurd and cynical to promote tobacco growing instead of switching to food crops. If Malawi were to use all its tobacco cultivation area to grow food, the harvest could feed 750,000 people.

The participation of tobacco companies in NAFSN only serves the industry’s commercial interests, including boosting their image as a responsible industry, which is promoted in the fight against tobacco control measures. Therefore, FCTC Article 5.3 must also be implemented in development policies in order to achieve more policy coherence for a sustainable future.

Sonja von Eichborn
Director, Unfairtobacco.org

MORE THAN 100 COUNTRIES/TERRITORIES HAVE REQUIRED PICTURE HEALTH WARNINGS

A global milestone has been achieved. More than 100 countries and territories —105 in total —have required picture warnings on cigarette packages.

This finding comes from an international report released today at COP7. This new report, Cigarette Package Health Warnings: International Status Report, provides an overview ranking of 205 countries and territories based on warning size, and lists those that have finalized requirements for picture warnings. Regional breakdowns are also included.

Copies of the report are available at the Framework Convention Alliance booth.

Delegates are welcome to take as many copies of the report as they would like for use in their home countries.

Fifty eight percent of the world’s population is now covered by final requirements for picture warnings, and many more countries are in the process of doing so. One hundred and five countries is an increase from the 77 countries that had implemented picture warnings by the end of 2014.

For size, Nepal is the new world leader with warnings that cover 90 percent of the package front and back. Vanuatu will require 90 percent in 2017. India and Thailand are next, tied for third with 85 percent India has improved its global ranking considerably, moving from 136th in 2014 to third in 2016.

There are now 94 countries and jurisdictions (up from 66 in 2014) requiring warnings to cover at least 50 percent (on average) of the package front and back, and at least 142 requiring a minimum size (on average) of at least 30 percent.

Enormous progress continues to be made around the world.

Well-designed package warnings are a highly cost-effective means to increase awareness of the health effects and to reduce tobacco use. Picture-based messages are far more effective than text-only messages. Indeed, a picture says a thousand words.

Pictures attract more attention, and reach individuals who are illiterate or who cannot read the national language(s). For size, the effectiveness of warnings increases with size. Larger ones allow for bigger and better pictures, additional information and/or a larger font size.

The new report, currently available in English and French, was prepared by the Canadian Cancer Society, in collaboration with the Framework Convention Alliance.

The Campaign for Tobacco-Free Kids is assisting with translations for Arabic, Chinese, Portuguese, Russian and Spanish.

Rob Cunningham and Meaghan Dunn
Canadian Cancer Society

Hazardous chemicals discovered in flavored e-cigarette vapor

Building on more than 30 years of air quality research in some of the most polluted urban environments on Earth, a team of atmospheric scientists has turned their attention toward the growing e-cigarette industry and the unidentified effects of vaping on human health.

https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2016/11/161110085644.htm

Building on more than 30 years of air quality research in some of the most polluted urban environments on Earth, a team of atmospheric scientists at the Desert Research Institute (DRI) has turned their attention toward the growing e-cigarette industry and the unidentified effects of vaping on human health.

New research published this week in Environmental Science & Technology (ES&T), a journal of the American Chemical Society, reports that the aerosols (commonly called vapors) produced by flavored e-cigarettes liquids contain dangerous levels of hazardous chemicals known to cause cancer in humans.

The study “Flavoring compounds dominate toxic aldehyde production during e-cigarette vaping” confirms that these toxic aldehydes, such as formaldehyde, are formed not by evaporation, but rather during the chemical breakdown of the flavored e-liquid during the rapid heating process (pyrolysis) that occurs inside e-cigarettes or electronic nicotine delivery systems (ENDS).

“How these flavoring compounds in e-cigarette liquids affect the chemical composition and toxicity of the vapor that e-cigarettes produce is practically unknown,” explained Andrey Khylstov, Ph.D., an associate research professor of atmospheric sciences at DRI. “Our results show that production of toxic aldehydes is exponentially dependent on the concentration of flavoring compounds.”

E-cigarette liquids have been marketed in nearly 8,000 different flavors, according to a 2014 report from the World Health Organization. Recent reports have shown that many flavors, such as Gummy Bear, Tutti Fruitty, Bubble Gum, etc., were found to be especially appealing to adolescents and young adults.

The U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) reports that 16-percent of high school and 5.3-percent of middle school students were current users of e-cigarettes in 2015, making e-cigarettes the most commonly used tobacco product among youth for the second consecutive year. In 2014, 12.6-percent of U.S. adults had ever tried an e-cigarette, and about 3.7-percent of adults used e-cigarettes daily or some days.

Khylstov and his colleagues measured concentrations of 12 aldehydes in aerosols produced by three common e-cigarette devices. To determine whether the flavoring additives affected aldehyde production during vaping, five flavored e-liquids were tested in each device. In addition, two unflavored e-liquids were also tested.

“To determine the specific role of the flavoring compounds we fixed all important parameters that could affect aldehyde production and varied only the type and concentration of flavors,” explained Vera Samburova, Ph.D., an assistant research professor of chemistry at DRI.

Samburova added that the devices used in the study represented three of the most common types of e-cigarettes — bottom and top coil clearomizers, and a cartomizer.

The study avoided any variation in puff topography (e.g., puff volume, puff velocity, interval between puffs) by utilizing a controlled sampling system that simulated the most common vaping conditions. E-cigarette vapor was produced from each device by a four-second, 40-ml controlled puff, with 30-second resting periods between puffs. The e-cigarette devices were manually operated to replicate real-life conditions and all samples were collected in triplicate to verify and confirm results. Specific care was taken to avoid “dry puff” conditions.

To provide further proof that the flavoring compounds, not the carrier e-liquid solvents (most commonly propylene glycol and/or vegetable glycerin) dominated production of aldehydes during vaping, the authors performed a series of experiments in which a test flavored e-liquid was diluted with different amounts of the unflavored e-liquid. Liquids with higher flavor content produced larger amounts of aldehydes due to pyrolysis of the flavoring compounds.

In all experiments, the amount of aldehydes produced by the flavored e-cigarette liquids exceeded the American Conference of Governmental Industrial Hygienists Threshold Limit Values (TLVs) for hazardous chemical exposure.

“One puff of any of the flavored e-liquids that we tested exposes the smoker to unacceptably dangerous levels of these aldehydes, most of which originates from thermal decomposition of the flavoring compounds,” said Khylstov. “These results demonstrate the need for further, thorough investigations of the effects of flavoring additives on the formation of aldehydes and other toxic compounds in e-cigarette vapors.”

HKU researchers call for total ban on e-cigarettes

http://news.rthk.hk/rthk/en/component/k2/1295926-20161110.htm

Researchers at the University of Hong Kong called for a total ban on the sale of electronic or e-cigarettes on Thursday, warning that they pose a very dangerous health risk, and may entice young children to start smoking.

They interviewed 469 smokers under 25 who had called the university’s smoking cessation hotline, and found children as young as 12 had tried e-cigarettes.

The researchers said e-cigarettes “tend to attract young people much more than adults, and there is actually strong evidence – not from Hong Kong yet, but from other countries – that many non-smoking young people started with e-cigarettes before becoming regular conventional cigarette smokers”.