With all the evidence stacked against combustible cigarettes, the search for a ‘healthy’ replacement for addicts continues.
E-cigarettes have boomed in popularity over the last few years meaning that shops and restaurants have had to add ‘or vaping’ to their no smoking signs.
The new trend has prompted various scientific researchers to claim that e-cigs will be the death of all humans one month, and the solution to the smoking crisis the next.
A new study funded by Cancer Research UK is the first to explore the effects of long-term e-cigarette exposure on the human body.
181 participants split into five groups (combustible cigarette users, former smokers who now smoke e-cigs, former smokers on nicotine replacement therapy (NRT), and current smokers who also smoke e-cigs or also use NRT) were analysed.
The participants’ urine and saliva were examined to find that levels of NNAL, a chemical linked to lung cancer, was 97.5 per cent lower in ex-smokers who vape compared to those who still smoked.
Lion Shahab said to Digital Trends:
The take-home message for smokers and e-cigarette users is that using e-cigarettes long-term is likely to carry substantial health benefits, certainly in relation to cancer risk, compared with continued smoking. E-cigarettes are certainly safer than combustible cigarettes.
The in-depth study concluded that e-cigarettes are definitely safer than smoking and ‘if a smoker wants to reap the full health benefits of switching over to using e-cigarettes, they should discontinue any use of conventional cigarettes’.
Compared with research on conventional cigarettes, the research on the health benefits and drawbacks is still in its infancy.
For now, it’s certainly seems to be the much lesser of two evils.
