
E-cigarettes ‘Potentially as Harmful as Tobacco Cigarettes’ - el_duderino
http://today.uconn.edu/2017/06/e-cigarettes-potentially-harmful-tobacco-cigarettes/
======
iaw
> UConn researchers found that e-cigarettes loaded with a nicotine-based
> liquid are potentially as harmful as unfiltered cigarettes when it comes to
> causing DNA damage

I don't like the way they've titled their research. Given that there are
numerous chemical additives in traditional chemical cigarettes that are known
to cause health issues nicotine may not be the dominantly harmful component in
cigarettes.

Discouraging cigarette smokers from moving to e-cigarettes is akin to
abstinence only programs, it's not a pragmatic approach to the realities of
the problem and human behavior. Of course the tobacco industry also has a
vested interest in cigarettes so it's favorable to them for media to be as
negative as possible about eCigarettes.

If eCigarette second hand smoke is less harmful than cigarettes and they _aren
't_ banned in the places that regular cigarettes are it would create a strong
downward pressure on traditional cigarette smoking...

..and it looks like the Altria group does recruit from UConn, if that actually
means anything.

~~~
mikeash
Discouraging smokers from moving to e-cigs is a bad idea, but discouraging
non-smokers is a _great_ idea. It's a tough tradeoff, and I don't think the
analogy to sex ed is really a good one. Virtually everyone has sex, so
teaching abstinence is foolish. But most people _don 't_ smoke, so saying
"don't smoke, not even e-cigs" is a good thing for that segment of the
population.

Ideally, you'd get all the addicts to move to e-cigs, and everybody else to
not use either one. Not that I have any brilliant ideas how to accomplish
that.

~~~
baddox
To be fair, while I don't support it, abstinence only sex ed is usually in the
context of high school, where it's probably not true that "virtually everyone
has sex."

~~~
mikeash
The abstinence part is (almost?) always in the context of "until marriage"
which can extend well beyond high school and remains highly mismatched with
people's behavior.

It should also be noted that abstinence only sex ed usually involves many
outright lies, such as that sex outside of marriage is objectively immoral,
that waiting until marriage prevents STIs, vastly exaggerated figures for the
risk of disease and failure rates of birth control, etc. Whereas smoking is
actually dangerous, and "don't smoke, it'll greatly increase your chances of
getting these various horrible diseases" is actually truthful.

~~~
olyjohn
Is that totally truthful though? How much do you have to smoke for it to
really be dangerous? If I keep a pack around for 1-2 months, and have a few
cigarettes a week, how much am I really increasing my chances? I don't smoke
1-2 packs a day like some smokers do, I certainly don't have the same odds do
I? Can it be possible that the truth is that you can smoke in moderation
without any significant increase in risk? I would certainly like to know the
real picture.

All I ever see is picture of black lungs, messages of certain cancer and
death. To me, this is like those people who have pictures of dead fetuses for
their anti-abortion message. It's extreme, and sets of red-flags in my brain.

I fucking love smoking. It gives me a way to chill out and unwind for 10-15
minutes. It's great for my mental health, because I won't do it in my house...
I have to get away from the computer, I have to stop what I'm doing. It gets
me away from everything.

~~~
mikeash
Searching around, it looks like even light smoking is still bad. Not _as_ bad,
but still bad.

"Light and intermittent smoking carry nearly the same risk for cardiovascular
disease as daily smoking.... In addition, the risk of ischemic heart disease
in light-smoking men and women aged 35 to 39 years who smoke 1 to 4 cigarettes
per day is nearly 3 times that of a nonsmoker."

[http://circ.ahajournals.org/content/121/13/1518](http://circ.ahajournals.org/content/121/13/1518)

There's nothing wrong with taking a calculated risk, but it is a risk.

~~~
bryondowd
Just for reference. 1-4 per day would be about a pack every 8 days, averaged.
I'd be curious how that compares to a non-daily smoker who as the grandparent
suggests, only smokes about once every other day on average.

I expect it's still a significant health risk, but I've never seen studies on
people who don't smoke daily.

~~~
posterboy
Those rare smokers practically don't exist; either they are wise and just stop
because they were just testing, or they increase their habit, because they are
still testing, until they forget why they even started and need the narcotics
to numb the pain they caused themselves.

How the damage happens is not important, but consider the possibility of
slowly accumulating effects because of a slow rehabilitation potential.

------
tryitnow
It looks like two things are being tested here: 1) Toxicity of e-cigs 2) the
validity of this new testing device created from a 3D printer

That doesn't make a lot of sense to me. A demonstration of the toxicity of
e-cigs should be based on well-established testing methods. And a new testing
device should be tested to see if it reliably replicate findings that used
well-established testing methods.

~~~
1_800_UNICORN
I'm surprised this isn't higher up, that's what confused me. How can they
report a new discovery while simultaneously testing a new measuring device?

There's a lot about the article that smells bad.

~~~
mistermann
It's not even close to conclusive, I think you'd be hard pressed to call it
science. Whenever you read these "studies" there is so much defensive language
and obvious outright lies, you can tell it is a propaganda piece.

> " _potentially_ as harmful"

> " _may_ contain"

> "have as much _potential_ to cause DNA damage"

> "found that vapor from non-nicotine e-cigarettes _caused_ as much DNA damage
> as filtered cigarettes" (at best they have a theory)

> "whether they serve as a gateway for future tobacco smokers _remains the
> subject of much debate_ " (if you call lobbyist propoganda "debate")

> "new metabolites that _have the potential_ to cause DNA damage are formed"

> "The device is unique in that it converts chemicals into their metabolites
> during testing, which replicates what happens in the human body, Kadimisetty
> says." (Does it? Is this scientifically confirmed with high certainty?)

> "Bioassays currently used to determine the genotoxicity of environmental
> samples may be more comprehensive" ("May" be? If you are speculating on
> that, then how do you _know_ that the results from these tests are
> trustworthy, as you are claiming?)

> "There are potentially hundreds of chemicals in e-cigarettes that could be
> contributing to DNA damage, Kadimisetty says." (Well, depends on your
> definition of chemicals)

> "Rather than test for all of them, the UConn team targeted three known
> carcinogenic chemicals found in tobacco cigarettes." (Oh? Which ones? And
> what was the source of the ejuice used for testing?)

EDIT: The three chemicals (thanks xaedes):
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14539062](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14539062)

B[a]P: Benzo[a]pyrene

NNK: 4-(methylnitrosamino)-1-(3-pyridyl)-1-butanone

NNN: N-Nitrosonicotine

I haven't a clue what these are, and in which component of the juice (PG, VG,
nicotine, flavor) would contain them....anyone?

~~~
Aaron1011
I can't read the full study, as it's behind a paywall - so take this with a
grain of salt:

> "potentially as harmful"

That's not 'defensive language', that's rightly acknowledging that a single
study isn't enough to determine one way or the other.

> "have as much potential to cause DNA damage"

What's 'unscientific' or 'defensive' about acknowledging that a substance has
a certain probability of causing cell damage? Claiming that something 'always'
or 'never' causes cell damage, on the other hand, _would_ be unscientific.

~~~
mistermann
> that's rightly acknowledging that a single study isn't enough to determine
> one way or the other

When read by a scientist, when read by mainstream consumers it is historically
referred to as FUD.

> "have as much potential to cause DNA damage"

"potential" vs "as much potential"....so how are they measuring the level of
potential? Since this is new technology, is it even proven accurate (cast is
doubt elsewhere in the document).

This article _implies_ certainty, but of course never states it outright, but
it achieves its goal: instill fear. And in this case, that fear can affect
sales in the hundreds if not billions of dollars, and might(!) literally be
the the difference between life and death for hundreds of thousands if not
millions of people.

------
Kequc
I was one of those people who was pretty well convinced that e-cigarettes and
cigarettes were both about equal as far as danger due to the nicotine.
E-cigarettes delivering on average throughout the day more nicotine than
cigarettes. And cigarettes, delivering ash.

A few years ago I read a convincing article to the contrary from the NHS.
Detailing how the most dangerous carcinogens came from combustion of tobacco.

Smoking related signalling has been a train wreck for a decade or more now, so
of course after this article came out the very same NHS started talking about
banning certain types of e-cigarettes. I don't know what's going on anymore.
It doesn't help that there are zealots that spam information about
e-cigarettes being perfectly safe, and charities that spam information about
cigarettes killing you and everyone around you so donate right away.

The internet has utterly failed us on data about smoking. If anyone knows
what's actually going on, then they are lost in a sea of other people that are
doing their best to shout over one another.

~~~
VLM
"The internet has utterly failed us on data about smoking."

Wikipedia seems fairly rational about nicotine

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nicotine](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nicotine)

It seems to boil down to "mostly harmless" whereas all the delivery
technologies for it, other than the patch, seem to be almost infinitely more
dangerous than the nicotine itself.

~~~
kwhitefoot
"mostly harmless" perhaps but definitely not "harmless".

From the Wikipedia article:

> by the 1980s the use of nicotine insecticide had declined below 200 tons.
> This was due to the availability of other insecticides that are cheaper and
> less harmful to mammals.

> Currently, nicotine, even in the form of tobacco dust, is prohibited as a
> pesticide for organic farming in the United States/

Actually the thing that pisses me off about e-cigs is the clouds of flavoured
vapour that I get bombarded with. I don't want to inhale second hand raspberry
flavoured steam.

~~~
mistercow
Don't worry: it's not steam, it's glycerin and propylene glycol.

~~~
Doxin
E-cig liquids are, much like smoke machine fluid, mostly water. Except maybe
the fluids used in the competitive smoke blowing stuff. glycerin/glycol is the
delivery mechanism, water is the propellant.

------
tmearnest
They did not report their methods for the ecig sample acquisition. It's quite
possible that they were not using the vaporizer under the normal conditions.
There was a previous study where they were running the device at excessive
voltages over tens of seconds, causing pyrolysis which would never happen
under normal usage. Simply because it would taste awful and make the user
cough a lot.

I would have liked to see control experiments: analyse the e-liquid without
vaporization, and analyse pure glycerol/propylene glycol. The former may show
a response, but the latter should not show any at all.

~~~
xaedes
Here it is documented a bit:

[http://pubs.acs.org/doi/abs/10.1021/acssensors.7b00118](http://pubs.acs.org/doi/abs/10.1021/acssensors.7b00118)

[http://pubs.acs.org/doi/suppl/10.1021/acssensors.7b00118/sup...](http://pubs.acs.org/doi/suppl/10.1021/acssensors.7b00118/suppl_file/se7b00118_si_001.pdf)

~~~
tmearnest
It's not though. No mention of the device, eliquid, device parameters (power
or temperature depending on the model), or puff duration. It's a pretty
significant omission.

------
joekrill
It amazes me to read the comments on articles related to e-cigarettes.
Everyone is quick to point out any potential flaws -- or even point out that
this is still _better_ than regular cigarettes. I suspect it's like taking a
time machine back 50 years and experiencing the same thing that happened with
cigarettes.

The fact remains, folks using e-cigarettes are still inhaling dangerous
chemicals. You'd have to be crazy to suggest this is probably not dangerous.
Just because it's delivered slightly differently doesn't really make it ok.

~~~
VLM
"folks using e-cigarettes are still inhaling dangerous chemicals."

They might be, or might not. It never fails to amaze me that a pill is hyper
regulated, food is somewhat regulated, and at least where I live vape juice is
completely unregulated for a couple more years. Whats in there, THC, benzene,
used engine oil, who knows.

Obviously its trivial to make a substance that when vaporized is harmless;
consider pure distilled filtered water. Its a hair trickier to supply nicotine
with the vapor. But when they go all ochem crazy with flavors and smells, who
knows whats in there and how long the users will live.

The FDA is moving extremely slowly on regulating vape juice. In a couple years
it'll at least be licensed and documented. Until recently it was complete wild
west.

I've never seen the FDA move on anything so slowly. There must be a lot of
political money involved.

~~~
mistermann
> Whats in there, THC, benzene, used engine oil, who knows.

The manufacturers know. Acting as if it is a complete mystery is disingenuous.

~~~
creepydata
But the manufacturer doesn't have to disclose that information if there's no
regulation compelling them to, or they can downright lie if nobody's there
watching them. Or just put random shit in there that hasn't been tested for
safety.

[http://www.webmd.com/smoking-
cessation/news/20150218/e-cigar...](http://www.webmd.com/smoking-
cessation/news/20150218/e-cigarette-ingredients)

>The results of one FDA review of 18 different e-cigarette cartridges found
toxic and carcinogenic chemicals in some but not others. All but one of the
cartridges labeled “no nicotine” did, in fact, contain nicotine. The authors
suggest that “quality control processes used to manufacture these products are
inconsistent or non-existent.”

> Flavorings: Goniewicz says hundreds of flavors exist, including cherry,
> cheesecake, cinnamon, and tobacco. Many of those flavoring chemicals, he
> says, are also used to flavor food.

>“These are the big unknowns,” he says. “When we eat them, they are safe, but
we don’t know what’s going on when we inhale them.”

~~~
mistermann
> Or just put random shit in there that hasn't been tested for safety.

a) Do you honestly think companies would do this?

b) The same silly "risk" applies to most any manufacturer - having a
"regulation" in no way guarantees your cereal manufacturer isn't putting
poison in your cereal, because why wouldn't he, right? (To use similar logic).

> The results of one FDA review of 18 different e-cigarette cartridges found
> toxic and carcinogenic chemicals in some but not others.

And the source manufacturer (country) of these? Zero details, as usual. Shall
we stop selling infant formula in the US because infant formula contains
melamine which can and does kill people?
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2008_Chinese_milk_scandal](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2008_Chinese_milk_scandal)

If these agencies weren't deliberately so opaque, I'd perhaps be less
distrustful.

Perfectly fair final point on inhalation of flavors, and good luck finding
anyone in the industry that is opposed to further testing. Everyone very much
_wants_ a safe product.

~~~
creepydata
Here's the FDA summary report -
[https://www.fda.gov/newsevents/publichealthfocus/ucm173146.h...](https://www.fda.gov/newsevents/publichealthfocus/ucm173146.htm)
\- and the actual report -
[https://www.fda.gov/downloads/drugs/scienceresearch/ucm17325...](https://www.fda.gov/downloads/drugs/scienceresearch/ucm173250.pdf)
it's not "deliberately opaque"

And um, yes, the supplement industry is essentially unregulated and is
notorious for doing exactly that - putting random shit in there that hasn't
been tested for safety and isn't listed on the label. That's up to and
including controlled prescription medications.

[https://www.livescience.com/40357-herbal-products-
unlisted-i...](https://www.livescience.com/40357-herbal-products-unlisted-
ingredient.html)

[https://well.blogs.nytimes.com/2014/10/21/dangerous-
dietary-...](https://well.blogs.nytimes.com/2014/10/21/dangerous-dietary-
supplements-return-to-store-shelves/)

Nor did I ever say, or even imply, we should stop selling e-cigs or any other
product for that matter.

~~~
mistermann
The supplement industry is very different, in many different ways, a gigantic
one being source of ingredients.

The point is, we have uncertainty being printed as confirmed danger, in a
billion dollar industry (with a very well documented history of deceit)
selling a product _known_ to kill, at risk of being completely disrupted.
Pardon me if I'm a little skeptical of misleading claims.

------
dgfgfdagasdfgfa
What an odd way to measure harm. It turns out being outside is more dangerous
than smoking is!

This is also laughable considering how utterly terrible cigarette smoke is—I
can't even imagine how I would make a vapor that harmful without combusting
something.

This is exactly the type of study you see when someone has it out for
e-cigarettes. Who is it? I smell Philip Morris cash.

~~~
mistercow
> I can't even imagine how I would make a vapor that harmful without
> combusting something

I mean, it wouldn't be hard. Plenty of simple chemical reactions produce
dangerous vapors.

------
Alex3917
"UConn researchers found that e-cigarettes loaded with a nicotine-based liquid
are potentially as harmful as unfiltered cigarettes when it comes to causing
DNA damage."

So in other words, less dangerous. (Given that most of the harms caused by
smoking don't come from DNA damage.)

------
ThrustVectoring
Pharmaceutical smoking cessation aids have something like $6B in annual sales.
E-cigarettes are generally more effective at quitting smoking than other means
like patches or gums. They're also a market where there are much fewer patent
protections for extracting rents out of.

I generally take a pretty cynical look at scientific findings that help
protect multi-billion dollar industries.

------
therein
Pretty low quality research to be honest. And I have read the paper. This is
the sort of smearing why we can't have nice things.

~~~
mistermann
What were the three chemicals they tested for? (Conveniently left out from the
article.)

------
atemerev
Since when "potentially" is a valid scientific statement, and not a clickbait?

~~~
iaw
Read the article, nicotine vapor from e-cigarettes have the potential to cause
the same damage to DNA as nicotine from traditional cigarettes depending on
the amount of nicotine present and duration of contact.

The claim in the title is utterly false because nicotine isn't the only health
risk issue with tobacco cigarettes. Essentially the results show that
vaporized chemical nicotine can cause the same amount of damage regardless of
how the chemical was vaporized. In summary they proved the obvious.

Edit: The term 'potential' in the research has a very clear and rigorous
meaning, the term 'potential' in the title is clickbait bullshit.

------
sscarduzio
Regular cigarettes are much stinkier, burn oxygen and POLLUTE like crazy, as
butts are not biodegradable.

The use of E-cigarettes should be encouraged as a middle-ground to cure (yes
cure, addiction is a disorder) those who still smoke.

~~~
LostWanderer
If i consume 100 smokes vs 100 vapes equivalent then what will be the total
damage done to the enviornment in each case,starting from the production to
disposal?

~~~
baddox
The environmental advantage, if there is one, is almost certainly on the
margins, and I don't know if the equivalent of 100 cigarettes would be enough
to realize an advantage.

------
BurningFrog
1\. Note the weasel word "potentially". Almost any statement is potentially
true.

2\. "...when it comes to causing DNA damage" is the far less sensationalist
claim in the actual text.

~~~
bougiefever
Right? A fall from a ladder is "potentially" as fatal as a fall from an
airplane, amirite?

~~~
posterboy
Ladder accidents are actually far more fatal, because hardly anyone falls from
a plane, if I am not mistaken.

------
bougiefever
The researcher was equating 20 puffs to one cigarette, but the article doesn't
say how that figure got selected. For a pack-a-day smoker, that would be 400
puffs a day. In a 10 hour period, 40 puffs each hour. I don't smoke or use
e-cigs. For someone who does, how many puffs are you taking in a typical day?
Do you think this is a good correlation? Do you typically, when puffing your
e-cig, take 20 puffs in a few minutes as you would a cigarette? When you did
smoke cigarettes (assuming you once did), does the number of puffs you take on
the e-cig correspond to how many cigarettes you would smoke? Maybe people take
fewer puffs to replace the same amount of cigarettes, which would undercut
some of the conclusions reached.

~~~
kostarelo
Naah, maybe an average of 150 puffs I would say. Not sure though. But 400
puffs seems a lot and I certainly don't vape that much.

------
013a
Their testing methodology doesn't appear to have vaporized the liquid. I
wonder if this has an impact on the results, given that the method of
producing the gas is different.

------
mtgx
One advantage of e-cigs is that people can lower the nicotine in e-cigs over
six months to a year, and eventually even quit. I guess they could
theoretically do this with cigarettes, too, but nobody actually does that.
Also it may help that you can still smoke for a while on 0% nicotine, just to
replicate the action of smoking, but without any nicotine. But at that point
you should already be able to quit completely.

------
LinuxBender
Fresh water is potentially as harmful as salt water, depending on how you
utilize it.

E-Cigs potentially saved my sons life. He grew up around smokers. I had no
control over this. Now that he lives with me, I fully support the use of
E-Cigs. He has almost stopped using E-Cigs and he has stopped smoking
tar+tobacco cigarettes completely.

Traditional cigarettes for certain are carcinogens and there is no dispute
they cause cancer and kill people.

------
theincredulousk
This seems like a shill study because someone unhappy with cigarettes
declining sales helped fund development of their neat-o 3D printed testing
device. It is already a red-flag that they say "3D printed"... they didn't 3D
print the (likely) massively expensive electro-optical sensing device, from
what I can tell they 3D printed the little sample slides that go in, and that
is what costs a dollar. I'm sure that will save some shekels but otherwise...

Saying "e-cigarettes" is nonsensical. There are 1000s of varieties of
vaporizers and liquids. I'd wager if you take some bright, sketchy liquid from
the corner vape shop and combine it with a $10 generic imported vaporizer
there is going to be some significant deviation with impurities/toxins
relative to e.g. JUUL or other products sold by a company that frankly has
something to lose if they get sued.

As far as I understand, most of the unexpected chemicals are coming from
vaporization or reactions based on the flavorings that were never designed for
that. Or vaporizers that are poorly constructed and burn glue/adhesives/etc
from the device as well as the liquid. So again you'd want to focus on those
individual components or chemicals, and it makes no sense to generalize
"e-cigarettes" by analysis of any one (for better or worse).

Also, not intuitively buying without far more evidence that vaporizing
glycol/glycerine, nicotine, and water shares a rough equivalence in DNA damage
potential to the raw combustion products of unfiltered cigarettes. There are
some 7000 chemicals in tobacco smoke, and the list of the _known_ carcinogens
is over a page long on Wikipedia...
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_cigarette_smoke_carcin...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_cigarette_smoke_carcinogens)

------
mrleinad
Well, if they're "potentially as harmful", then probability is on the side of
making the switch to an e-cig.

It can be better, or the same. Can't be worse, and you might leave it
altogether in the end if you make the switch.

------
snarfy
I would very much like them to list out all of those harmful chemicals.

I use unflavored e-juice. It's VG, PG, and nicotine. Three ingredients.

------
carlgueck
Anybody read the actual paper? I'm wondering what concoction of PG VG nicotine
and what flavorings were used. It's already been shown that fruity juices
vaporize into formaldehyde, so I'm wondering if they tested pure vegetable
glycerin vapor as a control and what were the effects.

------
makkesk8
Potentially, but about 100x less in reality. I guess time will tell.

------
juandazapata
I would like to know who put the money to conduct this study.

------
travelton
> "There are potentially hundreds of chemicals in e-cigarettes that could be
> contributing to DNA damage, Kadimisetty says."

> "...the UConn team targeted three known carcinogenic chemicals..."

> "...something in the e-cigarettes was definitely causing damage to the DNA."

What three carcinogenic chemicals did they test for? I hate when these studies
are locked behind a paywall.

~~~
xaedes
B[a]P: Benzo[a]pyrene

NNK: 4-(methylnitrosamino)-1-(3-pyridyl)-1-butanone

NNN: N-Nitrosonicotine

------
Exuma
Yeeks

------
45h34jh53k4j
Thank goodness we have CRISPR to fix our DNA corruption problems. Keep vaping,
crew!

