E-cigarettes have more carcinogens than regular cigs

Health News

Vapor from high voltage e-cigarettes can have up to 15 times more formaldehyde – a chemical that causes cancer – than traditional cigarettes, researchers said Thursday. Smokers who turn their e-cigs up to 11 to get more vaporized nicotine may also be getting an unexpected dose of the carcinogen. “We’ve found there is a hidden form of formaldehyde in e-cigarette vapor that has not typically been measured. It’s a chemical that contains formaldehyde in it, and that formaldehyde can be released after inhalation,” said professor of chemistry and civil and environmental engineering at Portland State University in Oregon James Pankow, co-author of the study published in the New England Journal of Medicine. “People shouldn’t assume these e-cigarettes are completely safe.”

At first it was though that since e-cigarettes lack fire to cause combustion, they would not release toxic chemicals like the formaldehyde that experts have known for a long time exists in cigarette smoke. However, new e-cig models are capable of operating at much higher temperatures, which can spark the production of compounds that contain formaldehyde. “The new adjustable ‘tank system’ e-cigarettes allow users to really turn up the heat and deliver high amounts of vapor, or e-cigarette smoke,” Portland State chemistry professor and lead researcher David Peyton said in a press release.

According to the researchers, electronic cigarettes do not produce formaldehyde-releasing agents at low voltages. However, newer devices allow users to put their own fluid and adjust the operating temperature at will, altering the amount of vapor generated. At high voltages, enough formaldehyde-containing compounds were released to render a smoker’s risk of developing cancer in their lifetime 5-15 times greater than the risk associated with long-term smoking.

The American Cancer Society said the study underscores the need for the FDA to step in and regulate the e-cigarette industry. “This study shows how little we know about toxic exposures that can result from using any one of the many different available types of e-cigarettes at different heating levels,” the society’s strategic director of pharmacoepidemiology Eric Jacobs said. “Until these things are monitored and regulated, there’s a real potential risk for unexpected exposure to toxic chemicals. We really don’t know what kind of exposure the users might get when using any particular product at any particular heating level.”

On the other hand, the American Vaping Society dismissed the findings as the ‘dry puff phenomenon.’ “When the vapor device was used at the realistic setting of 3.7 volts, levels of formaldehyde were similar to the trace levels that are released from an FDA-approved [smoking-cessation] inhaler,” president of the association Gregory Conley said. “However, when the researchers increased the voltage to 5 volts and continued to have their machine take three- to four-second puffs, this caused extreme overheating and the production of formaldehyde. Contrary to the authors’ mistaken belief, these are not settings that real-life vapers actually use, as dry puffs are harsh and unpleasant. In the real world, vapers avoid dry puffs by lowering the length of their puff as they increase voltage.”

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E-cigarette vapor filled with cancer-causing chemicals, researchers say.

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