There seem to be debate of how much better e-cigarettes are over smoking a cigarette. Some say e-cigarettes you are still at risk for lung cancer, lung disease and liver problems and heat problems.
That the US public health would rather people quite than take up smoking e-cigarettes as alternative to quitting.
That e-cigarettes are not that safe.
Another side-tracking … sigh … I link to the EPA site with a page showing that PG is indeed used in hospitals (and restaurants and many other places) to sanitize the air … and you quibble that I didn’t link to a site that shows a commercial grade installation of the equipment … those metered cans mentioned in the link are used by installing them in automatic dispensers which automatically press the valve every few minutes, releasing vaporized PG into the air … you have personally seen many of them that you just walked past without realizing what you were seeing, mounted on walls in hallways, restrooms, offices, etc. … some of them may have fragrance added to them, but they all have PG to kill bacteria.
My point is that PG is not some nasty new chemical that is only used in ecigs. It a substance that millions of people have been breathing day in and day out in many establishments for over 60 years. If you see a slight haze in the air when looking down a long hallway in a hospital, you are seeing PG vapor. The doctors, nurses and patients do breath it, all day, every day.
Guess what? I’m a physician who works in a hospital setting.
I’ve worked in a variety of hospitals from small town facilities to major medical centers over the last 30 years. I have never seen automatic propylene glycol dispensers in hallways, patient rooms, ORs, procedure rooms, morgues or anywhere else and I’ve never seen clouds of disinfectant spewing out willy-nilly on everyone, whether or not they have breathing problems already. I have also never encountered this chemical being “pumped into hospital ventilation systems” as you previously claimed. It’s intended (where it is used at all) for limited application in closed spaces. So I am calling bullcrap on this meme of yours.
And a final reminder that propylene glycol that is heated (as in e-cig use) produces propylene oxide, which has been identified as a probable carcinogen:
“Studies in animals have demonstrated that propylene oxide is a direct-acting carcinogen. B6C3F1 mice exposed by inhalation to propylene oxide developed hemangiomas and hemangiosarcomas of the nasal mucosa. F344/N rats exposed to propylene oxide in air developed papillary adenomas of the nasal epithelium. Degeneration of the olfactory epithelium and hyperplasia of the respiratory epithelium were induced in the nasal cavities of Wistar rats exposed to propylene oxide by inhalation. Squamous cell carcinomas of the forestomach developed in rats administered propylene oxide by gavage. Although epidemiologic data are not available from workers exposed to propylene oxide, the findings of cancer and other tumors in both rats and mice treated with propylene oxide meet the criteria established in the Occupational Safety and Health Administration Cancer Policy [Title 29 of the Code of Federal Regulations, Section 1990.112] for regarding propylene oxide as a potential occupational carcinogen. The National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health therefore recommends that occupational exposures to propylene oxide be reduced to the lowest feasible concentration.”
So breathe in that crap all you want, just keep it away from our respiratory tracts.
Can you name a hospital where this takes place?
Relevant part of the CDC’s recommendations for disinfection procedures in health care facilities, including hospitals:
*"CDC and HICPAC have recommendations in both 2003 Guidelines for Environmental Infection Control in Health-Care Facilities and the 2008 Guideline for Disinfection and Sterilization in Healthcare Facilities that state that the CDC does not support disinfectant fogging. Specifically, the 2003 and 2008 Guidelines state:
2003: “Do not perform disinfectant fogging for routine purposes in patient-care areas. Category IB”
2008: “Do not perform disinfectant fogging in patient-care areas. Category II”*
http://www.cdc.gov/hicpac/disinfection_sterilization/17_00recommendations.html
The CDC goes on to note that these recommendations pertain to fogging agents in use up to that time, but may not apply to the newest ones (i.e. ozone mists and vaporized hydrogen peroxide), which still lack solid proof of efficacy. But even these are intended for brief disinfection when patients are out of the room. Nowhere do I see any recommendation for continuous vapor fogging with propylene glycol or any other chemical agent. You do not want patients, staff or visitors constantly exposed to chemical vapors.
They don’t contain the “exact quoted phrase”, or really anything close to it, without some pretty stretchy interpretation.
If the vape liquid is unscented, then there is no scent. Many liquids are scented, I uses a flavored (and scented liquid), but you don’t have to, and still does not have anything to do with those who do not vape near you.
Speaking of which, just walking by a Yankee Candle shop gives me a migraine, those should be banned before e-cigs.
Hail Ants had already corrected himself on this point, long before you quoted it. And I would assume that it is a misspeak as he claimed, as his previous sentence is comparing them to other nicotine delivery systems.
Though, and I am not sure why one would exactly, but you can get liquid with no nicotine in it. It is not an inherent property to vape liquid.
That’s actually what those studies show. You can dispute those studies and their methodologies if you like, but just dismissing them isn’t helpful. There is a ton of pollution, both natural and man-made, indoor and outdoors. How vape vapor compares to those is a significant issue in assessing their risk.
Low levels of toxins in vape are shown in the studies, but those studies do not point out the background levels of pollution are much higher than the concentration of chemicals in the even first hand vapor.
That’s not denial, that’s pointing out the fact that vapor does not contain the same chemicals as a cigarette. Is that what you are disputing here?
I will disagree with the second hand smoke part, I don’t know exactly how much linking there is between second hand smoke and smoking related illness, but my default assumption is that sharing an enclosed space with a smoker is probably not all that healthy.
What you quoted did not say what you thought it said. You have to add quite a bit of hyperbolic stretching to get to that point. Seriously, is “If you don’t entirely support vaping everywhere and anywhere, don’t you have empathy for the many who will die if you don’t?” in any way similar to “I do feel some empathy for the many who will die if they are denied the use of this new technology – don’t you?”
Those are two entirely different statements. They do not even share the same room. If one was a heavy smoker, the other would have no concern about second hand smoke.
But you are causing harm to the entire group with broad brush hyperbolic portrayals of vapers and their arguments.
Vaping had made an tremendous improvement in my life, and may very will have added 20 years time. Quitting is not an option for me, after my last attempt, I had pretty much resigned myself to the fact that I was probably going to die much earlier. Vaping has changed that, I may actually make it to 80 or 90. If vaping were to be regulated out, or if the only options were limited to the rather terrible offering of e-cigs provided by the tobacco companies, then I will probably just go back to smoking regular cigarettes.
I’ve tried to follow this thread and learn something. I’m a smoker, 20+ years now and I’ve tried everything under the sun to quit. In fact, I’ve probably been trying to quit for 10 years now.
I tried one of the “stick” ecigs and found it to be a completely unsatisfying alternative to smoking. And as to the topic of this thread - the negative connotations of vaping (douchey hipster behavior, pretentious entitled attitudes, “cloud chasers”, etc.) have created a pretty negative predisposition.
One of the hardest things is the amount of information out there and the validity of that information. It seems almost impossible to get a clear, direct answer related to the health risks. This thread is a perfect example. I know the risks of smoking, there are decades of data and information out there. There seems to be very little information out there on vaping that isn’t subject to accusations of bias, big tobacco influence, agendas, etc.
One thing I’ve not seen mentioned so far is the articles mentioning “popcorn lung” as a negative health effect of vaping. Is this legit? Is it propaganda? Again, it seems extremely difficult to filter the wheat from the chaff.
Popcorn Lung is caused by diacetyl, a flavoring agent. There may still be some small home-brew hole in the wall type vendors using it but most eliquid makers have stopped using it and a few other flavorings that are potential problems.
Just look for a statement on their website along the lines of “Our eliquids contain no diacetyl.” Or ask at the store if it is being made on premises. If they won’t tell you what’s in their juice, buy it somewhere else.
Personally, I mix my own and add no flavoring … just nicotine, PG, and a very small amount (2%) of VG (vegetable glycerin). The VG is what produces most of the visible vapor. When you see cloud chasers spewing huge clouds, they are almost certainly using high VG juice, often 100% VG with no or very low nicotine or PG because the PG reduces their vapor cloud and having more than perhaps 3% nicotine would choke them.
Nice to see a question from someone seriously seeking information.
E-cigs are new, and their effects are not well known. There is circumstantial evidence that they are a much safer alternative to the burning of leaves method of tobacco ingestion, but the jury is still out.
It may turn out that they kill you even more quickly, but at least in the mean time, you can breathe better. After over 20 years of smoking, going up a flight of 7 steps would leave me winded for a couple minutes. Now I can run up them and be just fine, except for my knees.
Popcorn lung is stupid. People did find traces of a chemical related to the chemical thought to cause popcorn lung in people who worked around flavoring compounds all day. The levels of this chemical are very small, and are significantly smaller than those found in tobacco smoke. So even if it is something to be concerned about, it is still much better than smoking.
There are problems with both of these statements.
First of all, it’s not just diacetyl that has been linked to bronchiolitis obliterans, a nasty lung disease. Two other flavoring agents used in e-cigs, acetoin and 2,3-pentandedione have been found to be associated with the condition. Furthermore, a study has found these “flavoring agents” to be ubiquitous in e-cigs.
"The heating, vaporization, and subsequent inhalation of these flavoring chemicals in e-cigarettes makes an exposure pathway for these flavorings that has significant similarities to those of the workers at the microwave popcorn facilities (who developed “popcorn lung”)…Diacetyl—a flavoring compound associated with the development of “popcorn lung” in workers after inhalation exposure—was detected in 39 of the 51 flavored e-cigarettes tested in this study, including flavors that have particular appeal to children, teenagers, and young adults. Forty-seven of the 51 flavors tested in our study had at least one of the three flavoring compounds detected (diacetyl, 2,3-pentandedione, acetoin). These compounds were ubiquitous among flavor types: “tobacco” and “menthol” flavored e-cigarettes contained diacetyl despite not being listed on OSHA’s list of flavors that likely contain diacetyl "
http://ehp.niehs.nih.gov/15-10185/
I also love the dismissal of this potential hazard by Turble on the grounds that it’s supposedly just small fly-by-night e-cig makers that use these chemicals. In addition to how frequently the study turned up their use, weren’t we supposed to be saluting the small entrepreneur for innovation in e-cigs and damning the big tobacco companies selling similar products?
We do not know yet how great a risk of lung disease there might be from these and other e-cig ingredients, either for users or others exposed to the chemicals secondhand. Isn’t it lovely though how eager users and suppliers are to create a new generation of guinea pigs?
It’d be nice to see responses and acknowledgement of errors from someone who’s allegedly serious about informing Dopers.
It looks like I was right: There is no war between big tobacco and the vaping industry.
You can deny the words that are written in this thread and I’m not going to keep arguing with each quote. I don’t spend energy nitpicking basic English usage (like explaining the difference between ‘all’, ‘some’, and ‘none’ and which should apply to a given statement) or trying to argue that someone ‘misspeaking’ by saying something that vape defenders routinely say was really just innocently ‘misspeaking’.
Or maybe fanatical vape defenders are causing harm to the entire group by making absurdly hyperbolic claims about the dangers and benefits of vaping, and I’m just calling them out and pointing out that their wild claims are part of the reason for “Why the vape-hate”.
Which is utterly irrelevant to the question of ‘what is contained in vape exhaust’.
Most eliquid makers say they have stopped using it, but one of the problems with the safety of vaping equipment is that there isn’t any general inspection or enforcement of purity standards. You don’t really know whether or not they have, and people in this thread have pointed out that testing of eliquid has turned up chemicals that aren’t supposed to be there in the recent past. This is one reason why there is a push to regulate the industry, and the absolute stone-walled resistance to the concept from hardcore vape defenders is another reason for the vape-hate.
I am not denying words written in this thread, I am disagreeing your attempts at summing them up.
Your strawman statement was “If you don’t entirely support vaping everywhere and anywhere, don’t you have empathy for the many who will die if you don’t?”. It’s not nitpicking to ask you to back up your claim, but I certainly can’t force you to, it’s been nearly a month after all.
That’s an absolute statement. If you had said something like, “If you are unwilling to negotiate to a compromise so that those who find vaping to be a positive life changing device that may save them, then you are ignoring the very real concerns of millions of tobacco users (cig and vape users alike)” then I would have agreed entirely that that is a reasonable summation.
Same as your claim that others said “can’t possibly hurt the user or anyone else”, once again, you aren’t using relative words like some or most, that’s an absolute statement. If you had said, “Are willing to risk their health on an untested product, that by all first appearances seems to be much less harmful than smoking, but has not been thoroughly tested to assure that.” then I would have had no argument with that either.
Explaining the difference between words that you did not use may be an interesting exercise for developing English skills, but would have no bearing on your argument.
Given that Hail Ant’s statement and correction to his own statement were made before you quoted them, it makes more sense to give the benefit of the doubt on it, than to assume a backpedal, especially given the context, in that he was saying that it was a different method of nicotine delivery, saying that it did not contain nicotine does not make sense, and his self correction makes more.
I personally, other than what I believe to be a typo from hail ants, have never heard anyone defend vapes by saying that they do not contain nicotine. I mean, they can be nicotine free, and some people seem to like that, but that is not what we are talking about here. It is certainly not “something that vape defenders routinely say”
The only hyperbolic claim that I saw was the one about second hand smoke, which, not only does not relate to vaping, but I am on record in this thread disagreeing on. There has been discussion about different studies, and results of different studies, and which studies are more accurate than others, but a hyperbolic claim like “can’t possibly hurt the user or anyone else”, is something that is only found in anti-vaper’s posts as strawmen.
Claims of, “is most likely much safer than cigarettes” is probably about the strongest claim you can find on the pro-vape side, and even in the unlikely event that claim turns out to be untrue, it is still not hyperbolic.
But extremely relevant to the topic of the thread, in that, should vaping receive enough hate, and gets regulated out of the market, or almost as bad, is regulated to where only the tobacco companies can make a product, (which is what the tobacco companies are lobbying for in czarcasms link,) then I will lose access to something that has made a tremendously positive difference in my life. I know that I am not the only one. In fact, I know of several other lifetime smokers who turned to vaping, and are quite happy about the results.
Now, I am all for regulating and testing. If there’s something particularly unhealthy in the liquid, I want it removed, or at least the ability to not purchase that particular product, or at the very least, the knowledge that it is there, allowing me to make that choice. If it turns out that it is worse for you than smoking, I’d like to know that. If it turns out to be better than smoking, but say, only half as bad, then that would be good to know too, it would allow me to make better decisions. I am supportive of bans on vaping in pretty much all places that smoking is banned. I am supportive of not being tolerant of “cloud chasers” or others who try to show off, or whatever it is people think they prove by spewing huge amounts of smoke.
The concern is not that regulation will make things safer and better, but that stupid regulation will simply make them illegal or unaffordable.
I don’t even care if the cost goes up, even substantially. I spend so much less on vaping than I did on cigarettes that that’s actually a pretty nice positive as well. I think that it costing less is probably a good thing to get people to switch from cigs to vapes, however, If I find myself spending the same on vape as I did on cigs, then at least that’s break even. If they make it more expensive, or remove it altogether from the legal market, then I feel that that will cause far more harm than good, I would probably stick with it, but it would be harder to get others to switch.
Now, if your argument is that I should not have access to nicotine at all, that’s a subject for a different thread.
My wife smoked (tobacco) for 30 years and was finally able to quit two years ago when she switched to vaping. FWIW, she’s the exact opposite of douche-y and I’m very happy that she doesn’t smoke cigs anymore. To my snout, the scent is extremely faint and rather pleasant.
However: my niece and nephew (21 and 23) who have never been smokers recently took to vaping with unusual utensils. I do find this Hipster Silly and a stupid way to cultivate a nicotine addiction.
That’s great, but like I said I quit doing English 101 debates years ago. A significant chunk of your ‘disagreement’ amounts to not understanding or ignoring all, some, and none distinctions, which isn’t worth the time to argue with.
FYI, this is patently untrue as anyone can see by looking on page 2 - His ‘correction’ in post 89 came only after I quoted him and called him on the statement in post 63.
I quoted three claims from this thread significantly stronger than that in my response to you. You want to deny them, but people have clearly said that chemicals in vape exhaust are ‘just about indistinguishable from normal background’, ‘vapor does not contain the carcinogenic chemicals that cigarette smoke does’ and a ‘vaping is fundamentally no different than gum or patches’. You can put your fingers in your ears all you want, but the thread is there to read.
If you’re worried about the effects of vaping receiving too much hate, you should be standing against the people who you are defending now. Instead of denying their clear and easily understood statements, you should call them out on the outlandish claims, and try to get them to present a more realistic, reasoned appearance to the non-vaping world. I actually like vaping and think it’s a good thing, but when I hear these absurd claims about it being so amazingly safe I feel like saying ‘screw it, just ban this nonsense’.
That’s good for you, but a significant portion of vapers DO care a lot, there was a pit thread about a month ago where vapers bitterly complained that PA taxing ecigs at a lesser tax rate than cigs was going to completely and utterly destroy the industry, and that no one could possibly operate a business in the tax regime.
You were making hyperbolic statements that I did not, and still do not feel are representative of the arguments made here. There were no distinctions in the strawman statements that you made. Your statements were made in absolute terms, and were claiming to sum up your opposition’s argument.
I disagree with your summation, but we can agree to disagree on that, if you so like.
When you quoted it to me, it had already been corrected. And I stand by the fact that it makes no sense to say in one sentence that it is an alternative nicotine delivery method, and in the next to say that it contains no nicotine. I would assume that he meant carcinogens like he corrected himself, but if you feel that once someone says something, there are no take backs, and that is what they must have meant, then that’s fine too. I am reminded of this exchange I came across recently, which side in that conversation do you feel is more reasonable? Now, the fact that he also makes claims about second hand smoke being not harmful means I have no interest in defending him. I was only pointing out the error I saw in your assessment. We can disagree on this point too.
The first two claims there, are to the best of my knowledge, true. If they are untrue, I may change my mind over things, but at most, they would be mistaken claims, not hyperbolic ones. The third depends on what you mean by fundamental and difference, but it being a nicotine delivery system that has more similarities to patches and gum than burning leaves is maybe debatable, but not hyperbolic.
I still do not agree that there are absurd and outlandish claims. There are disagreements, there are different studies that some feel are more accurate than others, and some sort of misunderstanding about how hospitals disinfect their air. (That’s a good catch, btw, on a claim that apparently has either no or little merit that I may have believed otherwise.)
I did not ever get the impression that you “actually like vaping and think it’s a good thing,” since you came into a thread labeled “why the vape-hate?” and explained why there was vape hate. I got the impression that you were strongly against vapes as a whole.
I am sorry that enthusiasts being overly enthusiastic about agreeing with you makes you feel like changing your mind.
Like I said, I wouldn’t mind personally if they went up a bit. I do think that keeping them cheaper is a good thing from the public health perspective of getting people to switch from burning leaves to vapor. I don’t know if it would or would not destroy the industry, but I am sure it wouldn’t help. Regulating to where only the tobacco companies have a product on the market would probably not be all that useful either.
Most of my friends smoke. I very occasionally partake with them when I go hang out with them. It is a bit harder to bum a cig now, since I have converted many of my friends to vaping. One of the selling points I used was how much cheaper it was. The fact that I could get an entire setup, and juice to last a month for the price of 2 or 3 days worth of cigarettes makes it go over much easier. If someone is interested, I usually just give them one of my spare sets, and get a new one for myself.
If they were similarly priced to cigarettes, this would not be as easy a conversion, and if they were more expensive, people probably wouldn’t switch at all.
I would stick with the vape myself,and recommend it to others, even if more expensive, because I now like it more, for health and other reasons.
They’re commonly known as ‘crack pipes’.
They cause bad physical & mental consequences; you should encourage them to get treatment.
Am I being whooshed? 
If not: the kids are using hipster nicotine vapers, tho’ I imagine they’ve vaped a little herb now and then.
This is the correct answer, and all the second-hand hate is descended from it.
One of the most successful brainwashing campaigns of all time. I guarantee you that if you walk around with a candy cigarette in your mouth, people won’t change their attitudes even after you show them it’s not a tobacco cigarette.