Americans are confused about electronic cigarettes.A recent poll showed that the public was about evenly split between those who thought that electronic cigarettes, or e-cigarettes, were less harmful than conventional cigarettes, and those who believed that e-cigarettes were as bad as or worse than regular cigarettes.Unfortunately, there is no long-term safety data about e-cigarettes.What information we do have suggests that e-cigarettes have a complex mix of potential harms and benefits.First, the good news: e-cigarettes are almost certainly less lethal than conventional cigarettes.Cigarette smoking is a uniquely dangerous addiction.In fact, cigarettes might be the only consumer product that kills when used as directed.Cigarettes are the number one cause of preventable death in the United States, killing 480,000 people every year.That’s more deaths than HIV, heroin, methamphetamine, cocaine, alcohol, motor vehicle accidents, and firearms combined.Smoking increases the risk of stroke, heart attack, COPD, asthma, diabetes, and most cancers.

The free radicals in cigarette smoke physically age the human body.On average, smoking reduces your life span by at least 10 years.Tobacco could not possibly be approved for sale in the United States today if it was a new product coming on the market.A burning cigarette gives off noxious gases, such as carbon monoxide and hydrogen cyanide.Cigarette smoke also contains an ultrafine suspension of gummy residue, known as tar.Most of the carcinogens in cigarette smoke are found in the tar.The major benefit of e-cigarettes, compared to regular cigarettes, is that they do not produce the tar or the toxic gases found in cigarette smoke.An e-cigarette contains a cartridge of fluid, popularly known as e-liquid.E-liquid is made up of nicotine and flavorings dissolved in propylene glycol and glycerol.The e-liquid is superheated by a battery-powered vaporizer, converting it into a mist which is inhaled, or “vaped.” Studies about e-cigarettes and smoking behavior show conflicting results.E-cigarettes were mildly helpful in kicking the habit in one clinical trial.

In other studies, e-cigarette use did not increase quit rates, or was even associated with a higher risk of continuing to smoke.A recent review concluded that real-world use of e-cigarettes is associated with lower quit rates.Now the bad news.Nicotine in e-cigarettes may have several negative health effects.Chronic nicotine exposure may lead to insulin resistance and type 2 diabetes, although this risk may be offset by the well-known appetite suppressant effects of nicotine.Inhaled nicotine increases heart rate and blood pressure.Nicotine is highly addictive in its own right, and it may lead to changes in the brain that increase the risk of addiction to other drugs, especially in young people.Nicotine may also impair prefrontal brain development in adolescents, leading to attention deficit disorder and poor impulse control.These potential harms of nicotine are particularly worrisome in view of soaring rates of e-cigarette use in U.S.The nicotine in e-liquid may also be a household hazard.

Many e-liquids have candy and fruit flavoring and packaging that makes them attractive to children.Cases of nicotine poisoning from e-liquid have skyrocketed, with accidental ingestions of e-liquid by kids rising by 1,500% in the past three years.Flavored e-cigarettes may pose another health threat.They often contain a chemical compound called diacetyl, which is associated with a rare lung disease called bronchiolitis obliterans that causes permanent damage to the bronchioles (the tiniest airways in the lungs).e cigarette dse901Propylene glycol and glycerol, the major components of e-liquids, are not thought to be dangerous on their own.e cigarette amazonHowever, they may decompose when heated by the vaporizer, and be transformed into toxic compounds such as formaldehyde.e cigarette daraz

This is more common with newer vaporizers that use high wattages.Related Information: Harvard Men’s Health WatchWhether you’re trying to quit cigarettes altogether or just want to have a mid-dinner nicotine fix without being banished to the alley behind the restaurant, you’ve probably considered — or even vaped — an electronic cigarette.But a recent study published in the New England Journal of Medicine is bringing into question whether e-cigs are really any safer (or should we say less dangerous?)E-cigs, which work by heating a nicotine-containing liquid into an inhalable vapor, are generally billed as safer alternatives to regular cigarettes.Some studies — including those from the Roswell Park Cancer Institute — found that, while e-cigarette vapors contain toxic substances, the levels are lower than those in cigarette smoke.Still, e-cigarettes are still a pretty new contraption, meaning that the research on them is limited at best.What’s more, little research has examined the effects of using high- rather than low-voltage e-cigs.

Some electronic cigarettes allow vapers to raise the voltage.The higher the voltage, the bigger the nicotine buzz.So researchers from Portland State University (who suspect that many vapers are kicking it to the highest setting) examined the vapor released from adjustable voltage vaporizers when used at different settings.As the researchers increased the voltage from 3.3 volts all the way up to 5.0 volts, they found that the e-cigarettes began producing formaldehyde-containing compounds called hemiacetals.Yep, formaldehyde is no longer just a problem for traditional tobacco companies.In the study, when researchers used e-cigs at high voltages, they produced between five and 15 times more formaldehyde than what’s typically contained in cigarette smoke.“It took just three milligrams of e-cigarette liquid vaporized at a high voltage to produce as much formaldehyde as a whole pack of regular cigarettes,” says Christopher Asandra, M.D., founder and chief medical officer of NuMale Medical Centers.

“The amount of formaldehyde generated in the scenarios the researchers used is pretty alarming.” The researchers concluded that smoking high-voltage e-cigarettes is linked with a one in 200 lifetime risk of developing formaldehyde-related cancer.That’s five times higher than the risk associated with smoking cigarettes.(Meanwhile, the researchers determined that vaping at low voltages does not raise the risk of formaldehyde-related cancer.)However, those numbers are estimates, as e-cigarettes produce formaldehyde in droplet form and cigarettes produce formaldehyde as a gas.Formaldehyde inhaled as a gas is known to increase the risk of leukemia, as well as nasopharyngeal cancer, a type of cancer that strikes the upper part of the throat behind the nose.However, zero studies have investigated how formaldehyde-containing hemiacetals, in droplet form, affect cancer risk.“We don’t know exactly where the formaldehyde contained in hemiacetals gets deposited in the body, or whether it is as toxic as inhaled formaldehyde gas,” Asandra says.