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E-cigarettes. Miracle or menace?

  • Thread starter Thread starter catherinecherub
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catherinecherub

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BBC2 on Sunday 22nd. May at 21.30.
Michael Mosley investigates the dramatic rise in e-cigarettes. They're everywhere these days, but what does the latest scientific research on them reveal? Michael reveals what e-cigarettes are really doing to your health. Are they really better for you than cigarettes? What is actually in them? Is passive vapour harmful? And can they really stop you from smoking? Michael meets some of the scientists around the world studying them, asks a group of volunteers to try to give up smoking regular cigarettes using them, and even takes up 'vaping' himself, smoking an e-cigarette every day for a month to see the effects on his own health - no easy task for such a committed non-smoker.
 
Never been able to get my head round smoking and think there must be better ways to take nicotine.. e-cigs not being one of them... but then I a bit of anti-smoking zealot. Each to their own though.
 
Being a non-smoker all my life, my inclination is to opt for a "potential help" rather than miracle for helping free smokers and dissuade those who are not already addicted.


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catherinecherub said:
BBC2 on Sunday 22nd. May at 21.30.
Michael Mosley investigates the dramatic rise in e-cigarettes. They're everywhere these days, but what does the latest scientific research on them reveal? Michael reveals what e-cigarettes are really doing to your health. Are they really better for you than cigarettes? What is actually in them? Is passive vapour harmful? And can they really stop you from smoking? Michael meets some of the scientists around the world studying them, asks a group of volunteers to try to give up smoking regular cigarettes using them, and even takes up 'vaping' himself, smoking an e-cigarette every day for a month to see the effects on his own health - no easy task for such a committed non-smoker.
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My son 'smokes' these in different flavours. Last week his vapour was a bit bunged up and he was climbing the walls and not happy :mad: Will he ever be able to give up vapouring, as I personally see it as still doing all the things associated with smoking cigarettes :wacky:
I will try and watch this programme on Sunday, sounds very interesting.
 
Robinredbreast said:
My son 'smokes' these in different flavours. Last week his vapour was a bit bunged up and he was climbing the walls and not happy :mad: Will he ever be able to give up vapouring, as I personally see it as still doing all the things associated with smoking cigarettes :wacky:
I will try and watch this programme on Sunday, sounds very interesting.
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Well being so much closer to seeing the situation both ways, you are in a front row seat when it comes to miracle or menace.


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As an ex smoker .. I think vaping or e smokes are just as bad as smoking ... Time will tell if the are just as bad health wise !
 
What a ridiculous idea - a non smoker taking up vaping for a month to analyse the health risks! How on earth can there be an accurate analysis when the idea is not for non smokers to start vaping, but for smokers to stop! Seriously, I don't get it. Why knock something that people feel is working for them? For people that have given it all up, well done on managing. For those who explore all methods to get off, well done to them too.
No I don't have scientific facts to back up my hypothesis but to my mind it has got to be better than inhaling tar? There are many decreases in the nicotine strength of these ecigs (the addictive component), which enable people to cut down at their own pace and if it takes months on end before they get there, so what? Surely it is better than trying and failing at other methods?
 
The affects of vaping can't be analysed on already damaged lungs or other organs. In order to have baseline data??
 
Then it kind of makes a mockery of it Paula, as I don't know anybody who has taken up vaping from a non smoking standpoint. I'm assuming that it must be 99% of smokers who are going onto vaping, therefore there will be some element of damage of some sort, or at least changes to the pulmonary system, so the people who would benefit from the analysis, smokers, are effectively barred from it.
I must be missing the point here.
 
I respectfully disagree, I think from a research point of view they need to know and understand the affect of vaping. I don't think non-smokers are going to take up vaping instead of smoking (although I do wonder at some teenagers I see vaping)

Dr Moseley has done several programs where he has taken drugs or poisons or other substances to show what the affects are, no so that we would emulate him but just to show us and get lab results and so on.

I don't think he encouraged vaping for non smokers but only as a tool for smokers to give up the smokes.
 
paula.nolan42 said:
I respectfully disagree, I think from a research point of view they need to know and understand the affect of vaping. I don't think non-smokers are going to take up vaping instead of smoking (although I do wonder at some teenagers I see vaping)

Dr Moseley has done several programs where he has taken drugs or poisons or other substances to show what the affects are, no so that we would emulate him but just to show us and get lab results and so on.

I don't think he encouraged vaping for non smokers but only as a tool for smokers to give up the smokes.
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I unfortunately missed the programme last night, was it interesting and informative ?
 
Speaking as a passive smoker I find that e-cigarettes do adversely effect me, by making me cough and wheeze. However to me personally it's about 20% of the negative effects of cigarettes. I still don't like the fact that people can walk past me in the street and make me cough, but the cough isn't as bad with e-cigarettes.
 
I think the advertising of E cigarettes is wrong everywhere you go now there are stalls in the towns and even dedicated shops popping up everywhere selling E cigarettes. It is supposed to be an aid to stop smoking yet it seems to be promoted as more of a social thing the latest thing to do. TV ads show people in a social situation with friends all puffing away no emphasis is made on the giving up smoking Surely you use it while you are giving up then stop Making all the different flavours is ridiculous it just encourages people to go on using them even when they are no longer necessary but of course doing that makes more money for those manufacturing and selling them.
 
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For me, the most interesting thing to come out of it was that Nicotine in Vapes isn't addictive but in combination with the content of cigarettes is.

What wasn't explored was whether the addiction can be lessened by moving to vaping and from what I've seen of all my friends, I'd say this wasn't the case.


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As a 60 a day smoker for 41 years, I can say that vaping has been the only way I was able to give up tobacco. I tried all of the conventional methods, but gave up giving up. My wife suddenly had to go into hospital 3 years ago with a brain tumour, and wanting to be by her side I thought I'd try an ecig. I haven't touched a tobacco cigarette since. When I started I was on 24mg/ml nicotine. Now I'm on 3mg/ml. Not because I was trying to give up, but it has been a natural progression. My wife is an asthmatic and doesn't have any problems from me vaping (I never smoked in the same room as her anyway). I can breathe easier, no wheezing, no weight gain (from giving up smoking), and can now walk 10 times further. All in all, for me they are fantastic.

I just admit, Moseley was rather stupid to try vaping as a non smoker.
 
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