E-Cigarette Hazards or Big Tobacco Hype

Smoking tobacco is one of the top leading causes of death in the world. According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention,

“Cigarette smoking is responsible for more than 480,000 deaths per year in the United States, including nearly 42,000 deaths resulting from secondhand smoke exposure. This is about one in five deaths annually, or 1,300 deaths every day.”

However, e-cigarettes are still a relatively new mainstream smoking tool which, in some studies, have been linked to scores of people slowing or quitting tobacco altogether.

The International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health published a Belgium study that concluded,

“In a series of controlled lab sessions with e-cig-naïve tobacco smokers, second-generation e-cigs were shown to be immediately and highly effective in reducing abstinence-induced cigarette craving and withdrawal symptoms,…Eight months after the start of the study 21% of all participants were completely abstinent from tobacco cigarettes.”

However, many believe e-cigarettes are just as dangerous as conventional tobacco while others feel Big Tobacco is manipulating mainstream media outlets with subpar studies. Therefore, many are wondering if these are legitimate e-cigarette hazards or Big Tobacco hype.

On the Street

It is not uncommon to witness random people sucking on neon blinking metal devices anywhere from the size of a small box to a thin pen, blowing plumes of white smoke into the air. This smoke is mostly odorless and dissipates quickly making e-cigarettes a welcome change from the invasive, toxic stench of the traditional “cancer stick”. Plus, there are no cigarette butts to litter sidewalks and streets.

Vapor Tech

The technology for e-cigarettes is simple. The device holds a cartridge of a liquid tobacco solution that sits just above, but not touching, a rechargeable battery powered heater. The user sucks on the mouthpiece drawing hot air from the heater through the liquid, drawing out vaporized nicotine or just non-nicotine vapor.

It is a concept that has been around since the 1960s but it wasn’t until 2007 that it hit the American market. When these devices were unveiled it wasn’t long before they sold like wildfire quickly raising the eyebrows of the tobacco industry.

Fast and furious investors began reaping large profits and it looked as though the e-cigarette industry was on its way to eliminating unhealthy smoking, second-hand smoke, and possibly stopping lung cancer while making a financial boon at the same time.

Now, after less than a decade in the mainstream, the future of “healthy cigarettes” just may be faltering due to an actual health flaw or possible manipulation by Big Tobacco.

Initial Report: Lung Cancer

In 2014, according to Nature international weekly journal of science, a first study presented to the American Association for Cancer Research on e-cigarettes stated that

“The researchers found that the cells grown in medium exposed to the vapor of e-cigarettes showed a similar pattern of gene expression to those grown in a medium exposed to tobacco smoke.”

Study author Avrum Spira, a genomics and lung cancer researcher at Boston University comments,

“They may be safer [than tobacco], but our preliminary studies suggest that they may not be benign,”

These findings suggested that there was a risk of lung cancer attached to e-cigarette use.

Addiction: One for the Other

When e-cigarettes became an alternative to loose tobacco, touting less harmful results a huge consumer base erupted.

Within a short period it became apparent that people were choosing the lesser of two evils, prompting a combined study with the Rutgers School of Public Health to report that,

“former smokers who quit within the past year are four times more likely to be daily e-cigarette users”. (truth initiative)

The Other Side

Natural News reports on the details of a recent study published in the journal, Oral Oncology, found to be paid for by Big Tobacco affiliates. It concluded that two types of e-cigarettes “damaged cells in ways that could lead to cancer”.

These results sounded similar to the report in Nature but the actual study seems to be tainted, smelling a lot like Big Tobacco. Apparently, the researchers exposed cells that already had cancer to days of continuous e-cigarette vapor and obviously came up with positive results for extended cancer. This study, and many others like it, are now transparent enough to bring valid studies linking positive results of e-cigarettes into a more positive light.

It turns out that Big Tobacco may have a hand in swaying people back to conventional smoking, a proven killer across the board. Talking to a doctor about ways to quit smoking is best which may include anything from medication, a patch, gum or possibly e-cigarette protocol.