3 Things You Should Know About Electronic Cigarettes
Do you know that smoke from regular cigarettes is full of toxins? Their number is around 7,000 and there are 250 poisonous as well as 70 cancer-causing toxins. Even secondhand smoke is not safe to breathe.
E-cigarettes, on the other hand, emit much fewer toxins. This is because their steam is not a by-product of burning organic matter. This steam appears when electronic cigarettes heat the liquid with nicotine. But e-cigarettes are not harmless despite the fact that they are not as dangerous to the health as regular cigarettes. In this article, we gathered three things you should know about electronic cigarettes.
1. E-Cigarettes Are Not Regulated
Today, all tobacco products are strictly regulated by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) and must adhere to strict rules that include:
- Requiring manufacturers to publish all product ingredients.
- All new products require FDA approval before hitting the market.
- Any claim of a decreased health risk requires scientific backing that can be confirmed by the FDA.
- Tobacco products can’t be given as samples or sold to minors.
Today, products regulated by the FDA include cigarette tobacco, roll-your-own tobacco, cigarettes, and smokeless tobacco. But the FDA is going to control and regulate more tobacco products such as hookah tobacco, pipe tobacco, nicotine gels, cigars, and electronic cigarettes in the near future. All of these products should have health warnings, restrictions for sales, and be adhered to the minimum age.
Moreover, they should be inaccessible to children if they are sold in vending machines. The fact is that the absence of regulation concerning electronic cigarettes suggests that you don’t know the amount of nicotine contained or if the product undergoes any quality control.
2. There are some toxins in electronic cigarettes
Some studies have found that e-cigarettes can contain a lot of toxins such as acrolein, volatile organic compounds, acetone, formaldehyde, polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons, and acetaldehyde. In addition, different e-cigarette brands contained various amounts of toxins which mean means that you don’t know exactly what you are breathing in.
E-cigarettes can also contain heavy metals and TSNAs. Researchers found that electronic cigarettes can contain chromium (regular cigarette smoke doesn’t contain it) and several other heavy metals. Some e-cigarette emissions have a lower concentration of metals than regular cigarettes but they still contain them.
TSNAs are chemical compounds that tend to be powerful carcinogens. They are found in e-cigarette liquids and smoke. TSNAs can be found in both green and processed tobacco. These chemicals have a very negative impact on human health. TSNAs can lead to different types of cancer, such as oral, lung, esophageal, pancreatic, and liver cancer. Some studies also show that these chemicals can cause cervical cancer as well. So if you are a woman who smokes e-cigarettes, cervical biopsy should be a part of your regular physical exam.
3. Electronic cigarettes won’t help you quit smoking
When e-cigarettes will be a regulated product, doctors will be able to develop and approve specific methods to quit smoking. Smokers will also be able to rely on the quality of nicotine and liquids. Even now many people use electronic cigarettes in order to quit smoking and some of them are really successful in this. But the fact is that many people only shift their nicotine addiction from regular cigarettes to electronic substitutes. If you are looking for a remedy that would help you to quit smoking, it is better to consult your doctor about available options.
