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You don’t really know what’s in them or the damage they could do says Jersey’s top public health expert, who is warning Islanders that there are safer ways of giving up smoking than puffing on e-cigarettes.
The Island’s Medical Officer of Health is worried about the quality, effectiveness and safety of the new craze for smokers – products that are not yet regulated and have been reported to contain recognised cancer-causing substances as well as chemicals close to anti-freeze, which are especially harmful to people with asthma.
Dr Susan Turnbull said: “The concentration of nicotine varies from product to product, as do the other chemicals which generate or make up the emissions from the products. At present there is no quality assurance. It is open to the manufacturers of these products to seek regulatory approval as a quality-assured, effective smoking cessation product but none has done so as yet.
“Because they do not contain the same range of cancer-causing chemicals as the tar of conventional cigarettes, most people assume they would be less risky overall to health than conventional smoking. This may prove to be true, but only time will tell.”
“The adverse effects of nicotine use are well understood but the medium and long term effects of all the other chemicals in e-cig vapour will only become fully apparent with time. It is still a relatively new type of chemical exposure.”
The number of people puffing away on battery-powered e-cigarettes has grown considerably and new stats show that more teens are picking up an e-cigarette habit in the US than a tobacco one because they think they are cool and better for you.
Dr Susan Turnbull is concerned they are creating a new generation of nicotine addicts and are “re-normalising” smoking.
The atomisers mimic cigarettes and some even light up to look like the real thing. They have a heating coil inside that heats up the liquid nicotine stored in a cartridge. Smokers inhale the vapour but the smoke that comes off them is mainly water vapour.
But there have also been concerns about e-cigarettes leaking and the effect the unexpectedly high doses of nicotine have on people with heart disease.
Dr Turnbull says smokers are around four times more likely to stop smoking if they use a licensed stop-smoking product like a nicotine replacement patch instead and get support to help them stop.
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