E‑cigarettes were initially marketed as a sleek solution to help people quit traditional cigarettes — but that sentiment has largely gone up in smoke.
Research indicates that the majority adult smokers who try vaping find yourself using each, while many teens who never smoked are getting hooked on nicotine through vaping.
Roughly 11 million Americans vape commonly, and though vapes are still considered less harmful than cigarettes because they don’t burn tobacco — the source of tar and lots of carcinogens — mounting evidence shows they’re removed from secure.
A brand new study — published Wednesday in the journal ACS Central Science — revealed that e-cigarettes release a shocking amount of toxic metals, with some producing more lead in a day’s use than nearly 20 packs of traditional cigarettes.
“Our study highlights the hidden risk of those recent and popular disposable electronic cigarettes — with hazardous levels of neurotoxic lead and carcinogenic nickel and antimony — which stresses the necessity for urgency in enforcement,” senior study writer Brett Poulin, an assistant professor within the UC Davis Department of Environmental Toxicology, said in an announcement.
“These risks will not be just worse than other e-cigarettes but worse in some cases than traditional cigarettes,” Poulin added.
The research was led by Mark Salazar, a PhD candidate in Poulin’s lab, who desired to know more about what his friend — a vaper — was putting into his body.
When he tested the disposable vape pod within the lab, he was stunned by the outcomes.
“After I first saw the lead concentrations, they were so high I assumed our instrument was broken,” Salazar said. “That sparked us into looking further into these disposables.”
Researchers took , hard look into seven forms of disposable devices from three of the preferred brands — Esco Bar, Flum Pebble and ELF Bar.
They found “these disposable devices have toxins already present within the e-liquid, or they’re leaching quite extensively from their components into e-liquids and ultimately transferred to the smoke,” Salazar said.
A few of the devices contained nickel and antimony levels that would increase the chance of cancer, in addition to lead and nickel emissions that may lead to brain and lung damage.
Equally worrying is that the newer, disposable vapes appeared to emit more toxic metals than earlier, refillable vapes.
The researchers urged more research and regulation around e-cigarettes, especially since the market is outpacing the science.
While Latest York and the federal government restricted the sale of flavored e-cigarettes or vapes in 2020, the ban has probably not been enforced — and recent e-cigarette products are constantly emerging.
