The largest study on vaping safety to date has confirmed that vapers are exposed to far fewer toxic chemicals than are smokers, according to a story published on the website of the Australian Tobacco Harm Reduction Association.
The story, by Dr. Colin Mendelsohn, conjoint associate professor at the School of Public Health and Community Medicine, University of New South Wales, Sydney, Australia, referred to a study of 5,105 adults that was published recently in JAMA Network Open by a group of leading researchers, led by Maciej Goniewicz.
The study measured the levels of tobacco toxins in the urine in four different groups: exclusive vapers (vaping only); exclusive smokers (smoking only); dual users (smoking and vaping); and never-smokers
Mendelsohn said that the researchers had tested 50 of ‘the most important toxins normally found in tobacco smoke which cause most of the smoking-related disease, including TSNAs (tobacco-specific nitrosamines), PAHs (polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons), metals and VOCs (volatile organic compounds). Many of these chemicals were carcinogens or were toxic to the cardiovascular, lung or reproductive organs.
Mendelsohn said that the key finding of the study was that vapers had a 10-98 percent lower concentration of toxins compared to smokers for the toxins measured.
‘All levels were lower in vapers except for most metals and 3 VOCs (toluene, benzene and carbon disulfide),’ he said. ‘Vapers had higher exposure to passive smoking so some of the toxins may have come from second-hand smoke. Also, some chemicals such as metals stay in the body for years and may have originated from past smoking or other sources.’
Never smokers had toxin levels that were 19-91 percent lower than those found in vapers.
The study results were said to have been similar to other previous studies as summarised in the 2018 US National Academies of Medicine, Science and Engineering report.
Tag: Australia
Biggest study backs vaping
Vaping nicotine legally
The Australian Tobacco Harm Reduction Association has issued useful guidelines about how tobacco smokers in Australia can become nicotine vapers – legally.
In a note posted on its website, the Association starts by stating that vaping nicotine is a less harmful and less costly alternative for adult smokers who are unable to quit.
Smokers who switched to vaping felt much better, saved money and were exposed to far fewer chemicals than they were when they smoked, it said.
Most of those who switched needed to use e-liquids containing nicotine, at least initially.
And it was legal to vape with nicotine in Australia if smokers followed the rules below:- ‘Obtain a nicotine prescription from your doctor or other medical service.
- ‘Order nicotine liquid from a trustworthy international website or an approved Australian compounding pharmacy
- ‘If importing nicotine liquid, make sure you meet the requirements of the TGA [Therapeutic Goods Administration] Personal Importation Scheme.’
What's in a name?
Renewed calls are being made for the term ‘electronic cigarette’ to be replaced by ‘vaporiser; or another word or phrase that emphasises ‘vaping’ rather than ‘cigarette’.
According to a story by Diane Caruana at vapingpost.com, a piece published by New Nicotine Alliance Australia (NNA AU) describes how, during a meeting with tobacco harm reduction advocates, one of the topics raised was the use of the word e-cigarette, the term most commonly used to describe a device that has helped millions successfully quit combustible cigarettes.
Studies have indicated that these products are significantly less risky to use than are combustible cigarettes, and yet a large portion of the public remains confused and misinformed about their relative safety.
Some harm reduction experts believe that the ‘cigarette’ name adds fuel to this confusion.
“So, I ask all to drop the word e-cigarette, and start using vape or vaporiser, as it really seems to be the most logical alternative,” the NNA’s Charles Yates was quoted as saying
Meanwhile, the Australian Tobacco Harm Reduction Association (ATHRA) in October posted a blog on the same idea. ‘It is time to consider replacing the terms “e-cigarette” and “electronic cigarette” with something more appropriate,’ the ATHRA was quoted as saying. ‘These labels link a low-risk life-saving technology to a toxic and deadly product and are muddying the already murky waters of the tobacco harm reduction debate.’
It is interesting to note in this respect that an all-party parliamentary group in the UK, this year changed its name from the All-Party Parliamentary Group for E-Cigarettes to the All-Party Parliamentary Group for Vaping.
This debate, along with that questioning whether the nicotine industry should be associated with the tobacco industry, has been going on since electronic cigarettes first appeared on the scene.
That it has not been resolved is an indication that not everyone agrees that the ‘cigarette’ association is entirely negative. Some people suggest, for instance, that the word ‘cigarette’ within the term ‘electronic cigarette’ helps smokers realize that electronic cigarettes are aimed at them and are the sort of product that they might switch to easily.Industry accused of success
The tobacco industry is “reverting to tricks and stunts” in a bid to attract young smokers, according to a story in The Guardian quoting the head of the Public Health Association of Australia.
Adjunct Professor Terry Slevin made his comment after analysis published in the British Medical Journal’s Tobacco Control had shown that cigarettes with flavor capsules were the fastest growing segment of the combustible tobacco market.
Slevin described the modification of tobacco products to make them more ‘appetising’ as “an extraordinary assault on public health”.
“Any modification to tobacco products which clearly aim to increase rates of smoking and target young smokers should be ruthlessly resisted,” he was quoted as saying.
“Australia has the lowest rates of smoking in the world among young people, and we now have a situation where more than 97 percent of children under 18 are never-smokers. The tobacco industry is clearly seeking to reverse that success and is reverting to tricks and stunts which should not be tolerated.”
The Tobacco Control analysis published on Monday found the market for cigarettes with flavor capsules in the filter had ‘grown exponentially since being introduced in 2007’.
The analysis, led by the University of Stirling in the UK, found there was a dearth of research on capsule cigarettes.
Nevertheless, it reported that research with adult smokers in the UK, US and Australia had shown ‘consistently’ a preference for capsules among young adults.
More than half of past-month smokers aged 12–17 years in Australia were said to have reported having tried a capsule cigarette.Vaping under further threat
South Australia is taking anti-vaping policy to a new level, according to a note posted on the website of the Australian Tobacco Harm Reduction Association.
The Tobacco Products Regulation (E-cigarettes and Review) Amendment Bill 2018 currently passing through parliament (the bill has been passed by the lower and upper houses and is back in the lower house for a final vote next month) is set to be the harshest in Australia.
Under the proposed law, which would ban in-store vaping and taste-testing, South Australia would become the first jurisdiction in Australia to ban the sale of vaping products online, by mail, phone, email or fax.
The Association points out that the proposed laws protect the tobacco industry from competition and make it even harder for smokers to transition to vaping, a much less harmful alternative.
‘Smokers in South Australia are already struggling to quit,’ the note says. ‘Smoking rates have not changed since 2012 when 16.7 percent of SA adults smoked, according to the South Australian Health and Medical Research Institute. ‘In fact, adult smoking rates increased … from 14.9 percent to 16.5 percent from 2016 to 2017.’
Given these figures, the Parliament might be expected to be doing everything it could to help smokers quit.
‘Instead, SA is attempting to destroy the vaping industry and make it harder for smokers to access safer products,’ the note said.
‘Two thirds of industry sales within South Australia are online according to Australia’s vape advocacy peak body, Australian Vaping Advocacy, Trade and Research (AVATAR). More than half of all vendors based in South Australia do not operate a physical retail store and rely entirely on online sales.
‘It is hard to see how this could have any possible benefit for public health.’Warning: changes ahead
Graphic warnings on UK cigarette packs are expected to be replaced by Australian versions in the event of the country’s making a no-deal exit from the EU, according to a story at bbc.com.
Tobacco manufacturers have had to print images highlighting the dangers of smoking on all their products sold in the UK since 2009.
However, the government said in August that the images would have to change because the European Commission owned the copyright to those currently in use.
Now it says the Australian government has agreed to supply alternatives.
The change is one of many small ways in which a no-deal ‘Brexit’ could affect British life, and which are being flagged up by government departments via ‘technical notices’.University learns a lesson
The University of Newcastle (UON), Australia, has announced that it is reversing its whole-campus ban on smoking and vaping, according to a story at planetofthevapes.co.uk.
‘UON is dedicated to providing a safe and healthy environment for staff, students and visitors to our campuses,’ the university was reported to have said in a written statement. ‘We are proud to support a smoke-free experience.
‘From September 2018, designated smoking areas have been introduced at three locations on our Ourimbah campus and at eight locations across the Callaghan campus…’
Instead of a total ban on smoking and vaping, albeit that vaping suffers a de facto ban across the whole of Australia, nicotine users can now use the shelters provided.
Nat McGregor, UON’s CEO said the decision made by the university’s executive committee had not been taken lightly. “The health and safety of our campus environments is a priority that can only be achieved through the responsible behaviour of all,” he said
“Unfortunately, we have clear evidence that our smoking restrictions were being ignored in enough volume to cause real concern. Our smoke-free initiative resulted in people smoking in areas that are not appropriately cleared, increasing the risk of fire, as well as causing pollution to our wetlands from discarded cigarette butts. After an extremely dry winter, the risk of bushfire is heightened this year, and appropriate action was needed to safeguard our community.”
The planetofthevapes report said it was to be hoped that the decision would feed into a more enlightened stance on alternative cessation products.
Currently, the UON’s website advice to vapers is that there is no convincing scientific evidence to indicate that any alternative quit smoking method increased the chances of quitting smoking. Moreover, it warns that vaping won’t work, will be expensive, and carries ‘significant health risks’.
The advice for smokers is that they should use their willpower or make use of counselling and nicotine replacement therapy.There must be another way
Most smokers in Australia think that a September 1 excise tax increase was a tax grab by a greedy government aimed at exploiting and punishing smokers for their addiction rather than a genuine attempt to reduce smoking rates, according to a story at news.com.au.
The story, by Colin Mendelsohn, the chairman of the Australian Tobacco Harm Reduction Association and Associate Professor of the School of Public Health and Community Medicine, University of New South Wales, said that cigarette prices had doubled in Australia since 2008 and were now the highest in the world.
Increasing tobacco taxes was a proven strategy for reducing smoking rates, Mendelsohn said, but it seemed to be having a diminishing effect at these ‘stratospheric levels’. Despite annual price increases, there had been no significant fall in Australian smoking rates from 2013 to 2016, according to the three-yearly National Drug Strategy Household Surveys.
Tobacco excise had delivered a massive $12.5 billion to government coffers during the past financial year. However, this tax was particularly cruel at a time of zero wage growth. High prices exploited the most marginalised members of the community, such as low-income groups, Indigenous people and people with substance-use and mental-illness issues.
Another unwanted effect of high prices had been the exponential growth in the illicit tobacco industry. Illicit tobacco from smuggling and illicit tobacco crops made up 15-28 percent of the total tobacco market and funded organized crime and terrorism.
‘Australia’s tobacco control policy has always focused on telling smokers to just quit, also known as the ‘quit or die’ approach,’ Mendelsohn said…
‘However, there is now a viable alternative: vaping. Nicotine vaporisers (e-cigarettes) provide the nicotine that smokers are addicted to but without the tar and carbon monoxide that cause almost all the harm to health. Importantly they also replicate the smoking ritual and provide some of the pleasure and habit that makes quitting so difficult.’The evidence is in
Electronic-cigarette campaigners have headed to Australia’s capital Canberra to convince federal politicians to lift bans on nicotine vaping products, according to a story by Michael Black at abc.net.au.
A recent CSIRO [Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organisation, an independent Australian federal government agency responsible for scientific research] report found regular use of vaping devices was likely to harm a person’s health, but it suggested there were likely benefits in replacing regular cigarettes with e-cigarettes.
Brian Marlow, the campaign manager for Legalise Vaping Australia, said the report quantified points his organization had been making for years.
“They’ve shown the gateway theory, that vaping leads to smoking, just doesn’t exist; they’ve shown that vaping reduces smoking rates; they’ve shown that it’s safer than smoking,” he said.
“This is not a harmless technology, it’s just significantly less harmful than tobacco and that’s what we’re trying to get across.”
Currently, there are various bans across Australia that restrict the sale of e-cigarettes and liquids containing nicotine.
Many vapers purchase products online and some don’t know that it’s technically illegal to do so.New thinking in Australia
Electronic cigarettes are starting to garner support even in Australia where laws differ from state to state but where, in effect, the sale of e-liquids containing nicotine is either banned or heavily restricted.
According to a story by Sian Powell for The Australian, in Australia e-cigarettes are ‘winning major support from official and political organisations’, including the Liberal Party of Western Australia and the CSIRO’ [the Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organisation, an independent Australian federal government agency responsible for scientific research].
Elsewhere, the UK’s House of Commons Science and Technology Committee on e-cigarettes on Friday endorsed their use as a quit-smoking aid.
‘E-cigarettes present an opportunity to significantly accelerate already declining smoking rates, and thereby tackle one of the largest causes of death in the UK today,’ Powell said in quoting the report. ‘They are substantially less harmful – by around 95 percent – than conventional cigarettes.’
The UK report had recommended relaxing e-cigarette licensing and advertising regulations and potentially relaxing e-cigarette taxes and rules on their use in public places.
