According to their website, BioMed Central is “an STM (Science, Technology and Medicine) publisher of 277 peer-reviewed open access journals.” So it’s very interesting to see that they recently published a commentary by Riccardo Polosa in which he claims that vaping is actually 96% safer than smoking.
“Compared to combustible cigarettes, e-vapor products are at least 96%
less harmful and may substantially reduce individual risk and population harm [22].
Future research will better define and further reduce residual
risks from EC use to as low as possible by establishing
appropriate quality control and standards. Although large
longitudinal studies are warranted to elucidate whether
ECs are a less harmful alternative to tobacco cigarettes
and whether significant health benefits can be expected
in smokers who switch from tobacco to ECs, the emerging
evidence that EC use can reverse harm from tobacco
smoking should be taken into consideration by regulatory
authorities seeking to adopt proportional measures for
the e-vapor category [23].”
The health benefits of switching to vaping appear to be tremendous:
“Vapor toxicology under normal conditions of use is by far less problematic than that of conventional cigarettes [7], and exclusive EC users have significantly lower urine levels of tobacco smoke toxicants and carcinogens compared to cigarette smokers [8]. Thus, smokers completely switching to regular EC use are likely to gain significant health benefits”.
The results from a group of former smokers who switched to vaping are promising:
“Long-term changes in lung function have been monitored for up to 1 year in a large group of ‘healthy’ smokers who were invited to quit or reduce their tobacco consumption by switching to a first generation EC. Significant early positive changes from baseline of a sensitive measure of obstruction in the more peripheral airways (i.e., forced expiratory flow measured between 25% and 75% of FVC) were already detected at 3 months after switching in those who completely gave up tobacco smoking, with steady progressive improvements being observed also at 6 and 12 months (Polosa R, unpublished observation).”
Even former smokers with asthma appear to benefit:
“…smokers with preexisting asthma and COPD may benefit from regular EC use. In the only clinical study conducted to ascertain efficacy and safety of EC use in asthma, substantial improvements in respiratory physiology and subjective asthma outcomes have been reported [20]. Exposure to e-vapor in this vulnerable population did not trigger any asthma attacks”.
The commentary is full of gems like this that completely debunk the claims made by the anti-vaping fanatics who want to see it banned or oppressively regulated.
You can read the whole article here.
What do you think? Is this going to help persuade the anti-vapers or are they so determined to ban vaping that nothing will change their mind?
