The below video (end of post) may help some understand what was happening in the US Vape scare. (Sept 2019).
It also makes a lot of sense when you consider that vaping e-liquid for over a decade caused nothing like what happened in the US and all of a sudden inside of 1 month, the vape scare popped up. It also had a high percentage of teenagers involved . eg: A teenager is not lightly to admit vaping illegal ‘cannabis’ vapes (the apparent cause of the scare) so ‘maybe’ chose to just say they were vaping ordinary standard nicotine e-liquid. At the time of this post, I believe there are approximately 8 million vapers world wide. (EDIT: 8 million USA…41 Million worldwide) and again, nothing like the US vape scare among those 41 million vapers came to light until Aug/Sept 2019 and only in the USA. ( Of course, this can now happen anywhere in the world as others can make up THC cartridges and use incorrect ingredients). Not to mention that some may start making up their own nicotine e-liquid (with no THC) with DIY ingredients not obtained from an informed and legit vaping store and God knows what trouble that will throw up.
It also seems at the time of writing this post that lipoid Pheumonia has been found as a problem, however, I have an found an article (below) which seems to outright contradict this. (and as a vaper myself, I’m open to everything regarding my tobacco harm reduction, but I can’t understand how all of these white coats cannot simply state the facts of whether or not it is a fact (or at least give a % or degree of lightly-hood) that one can get Lipoid Pheumonia if standard nicotine e-liquid has no lipoids ? It seems to me that once a white coat has nailed his colours to the mast, they will defend their opinions to the end, even if evidence contradicts their original findings. I find this happens a lot with professionals, (solicitors,accountants,doctors et al). I find professionals just can’t seem to admit they are wrong. Anyone reading this post must know one of the above and know what I mean. Hmmm, on reflection, maybe I can understand why there is so much disagreement among the white coats but considering there are so many lives at risk, I cannot understand why the white coats cannot verify beyond a reasonable doubt their opinions on the issue before they put their name to it. (Dr Farsalinos also weighed in on the lipoids arguments in a previous I put up…The witch hunt against vaping…)
Lipoid Pneumonia and Vaping
JD: How did the idea that vaping leads to lipoid pneumonia arise?
RP: Lipoid pneumonia is a rare respiratory illness that may occur from aspiration or inhalation of fatlike material in the lung; this has been reported in elderly people after accidental ingestion of oil-based laxatives.
There is no way vaping could put people at risk for lipoid pneumonia simply because vaporization of commercially available e-liquids do not contain fatlike material. However, I am aware of two reports of lipoid pneumonia that respiratory physicians in the US and subsequently in Spain have suggested being direct consequence of vaping.
After careful review of these clinical cases, I could identify a more plausible cause for these patients’ lipoid pneumonia. I do not understand why my colleagues incriminated vaping. Most probably, they (erroneously) reasoned that inhalation of vegetable glycerine in the e-liquid could have been the cause without considering that glycerin is not a lipid, but an alcohol. By definition alcohol cannot cause lipoid pneumonia.
(above full story can be found here : https://www.ecigarettedirect.co.uk/ashtray-blog/2015/08/e-cigarettes-lipoid-pneumonia.html
Apparently, it seems the scare is all around illegal black market THC cannabis cartridges (which again makes sense why this problem is only in US (up to this occurrence anyway)…and yet, the logic of the US white coats seems to be that all vaping products (41 million users) should be tarred with the same brush? With that kinda logic, when VW had a problem with ‘starting motor’ problems in which some of their cars were catching fire, would the US have told all owners of ALL VW’s with ‘a starting motor’ to not drive their cars ?
I also just wanted to get the news out there to inform people that counterfeit liquids can be very dangerous. Making these liquids in your bathtub or garage like a in Breaking Bad episode is a real threat. Where there is ‘enough’ money to be made, the counterfeiters will be there and you can be sure of that…but bear in mind that we are all inhaling these liquids into our lungs to stay away from the nasties in tobacco. Remember, they are not counterfeit Gucci bags or Rolex watches. ie: A counterfeit bag or a watch wont kill ya. The below video is a good lesson we can all learn from the US scare which I believe is information that people need to be made aware of. It is also a good lesson of what can happen if e-liquids are banned or over regulated. ie: Hello Black Market. So lets continue to keep the criminals out of this eh.
Nov 21 2019 Latest. It seems the CDC has found the culprit. CDC has identified vitamin E acetate as a chemical of concern among people with e-cigarette, or vaping, product use associated lung injury (EVALI). Recent CDC laboratory testing of bronchoalveolar lavage (BAL) fluid samples (fluid samples collected from the lungs) from 29 patients with EVALI submitted to CDC from 10 states found vitamin E acetate in all of the samples.
FYI…This E acetate is not a chemical in regular nicotine e-liquids…furthermore, the TPD regulations in the EU test every individual eliquid flavour (and nicotine strength) for any nasties before they are placed on the market and if any are found, the eliquid in question will not pass. All new eliquids which have passed the TPD regulations, must still wait a further 6 months before being placed on the market.
www.youtube.com/embed/exRRX0xrKvE?feature=oembed