Beating the smoking ban with a big (electronic) stick!

[BrewStew]

Heard a news report today of a new gadget sweeping the world called an E-Cigarette

ever heard of it? it's only been out a couple of years but is seriously gaining some momentum.

I decided to look it up. what i can tell it's an electric device that contains a solution of nicotine mixed with a harmless solution and water that is vaporized electronically and inhaled. the result is a vapour, and i stress VAPOUR, not smoke, that appears, and tastes, but does not smell ( of anything at all) of cigarettes. and your exhaled vapours contain pretty much nothing but a harmless glycol. its also perfectly legal to use anywhere.

i've got the bosses approval and am allowed to use one while i'm at my desk at work :thumb: so have decided to get a start pack ordered for £35 (with enough cartridges for 200 cigs worth) and give it a go.

i went for the Super Mini which is the smallest and most convincing looking, but apparently have a little less battery juice and nicotine fluid than the bigger ones.

i've registered at the e-cigarette forum to get a bit more clued up about it, but from what i can tell it's pretty much an identical experience to using the real thing.

note though that this is NOT being marketed as a form of NRT but a less harmful substitute for smoking the real thing. but i've read a few success stories of using it to give up as it does come in varying grades of nicotine including NONE, for the people that just miss the action and flavour.

to all you smokers out there that (like me) have given the pub a miss because you enjoy a smoke, i think we've got the answer!

no, i'm not affiliated before you ask... i'm just excited that i'll be able to puff away in a pub again, in the warmth and not the rain... and wont be harming others around me and doing less damage to myself in the process :drink:

 

[MEB]

Cool! Being a smoker myself this interests me. Let me know how you find it BS. I'd be interested in your thoughts.

 

[BrewStew]

if i can get my web or phone cam going i'll record my very first experience with it

here's a promotional video link though:

Clicky

 

[Aleman]

Apparently the government is concerned at the rate these things are selling and are looking into the 'health' implications :hmm: :hmm:

 

[BrewStew]

That can only be a good thing to get clarification :thumb:

from what i've read the Propylene Glycol is already known to be safe for consumption, but studies have yet to be made regarding it's inhalation as a vapour. there are also variants of the liquid that use different vapour making ingredients instead, such as Vegetable Glycol but according to This Link, those ingredients are already in some normal cigs anyway!

further reading (and i was up until 1:30 this morning reading up on the ingredients and their effects) have made me come to the personal (still uneducated though as i'm no biologist) conclusion that for the user, it cant be anymore harmfull that a real one, as a real one has more than a few thousand chemicals of which several hundred toxins and carconegens in it. for the person sat next to them, i believe there have been studies looking at what is exhaled, and if memory serves from my reading, it's about 5% of what was inhaled, and of that 5% it's mostly Glycol, and a tiny portion of nicotine, mixing with the air to barely detectable rates almost instantly.

i'm still really excited about the prospect though, even if there is a mild risk... and lets be frank, pure Nicotine is a fatal POISON in adults in doses larger than 40-60mg in one hit. so lets not get lead to believe this is entirely "safe" for one minute.

edit: and the above comment about the lethality of nicotine includes absorbing through the skin... not just drinking or inhaling it! but next time your in boots or whereever, take a look at the amount of nicotine in a nicorette patch... 100mg !!!

additional edit: writing that's made me wanna put a warning straight away to owners of pets and children... cos kids could so easily take a drag of one of these as they self activate from sucking... not to mention they look like a toy. you can also buy top up vials which contain enough nicotine to kill 5 adults... so for the love of god be super careful if you've got kids and pets.... if anything i think this is THE BIGGEST danger about e-cigs.

 

[delboy]

Im not a smoker and never have been but i'd be slightly concerned about these items if i was, at present these all seem to be manfactured in china. They can't even safeguard the quality and safety of a staple like milk, would you really trust their quality control with a highly toxic susbtance like nicotine :hmm:

 

[BrewStew]

that's a really fair point! and has actually got me thinking about it :hmm:

i'll look into the regulations they have on controlled drugs/poisons tonight.

as for the devices themselves, i dont think a faulty one would give you an overdose as each cartridge only holds 18mg for the strong ones, and you'd have to somehow drink it or something... it's the cartridge doses themselves i'd be a bit more concerned about if they had no regulation or quality control. but then that's negated by the ability to add your own nicotine with a pippet from a vial of solution made in a place other than china.

 

[delboy]

40-60 mg (0.6-1.0 mg/kg) is a fatal dose, i'd be careful with that dropper

Seriously though if they can make this in a quality controlled environment and there is relatively few risks involved (above and beyond nicotine intake), i say more power to you. If it doesn't harm others around you and you've made an informed educated decision to use them, then why not, no worse than me pouring booze down my neck :thumb:

 

[Buzz]

from what i've read the Propylene Glycol is already known to be safe for consumption, but studies have yet to be made regarding it's inhalation as a vapour.

And you will be sharing this vapour with your co-workers

 

[BrewStew]

Cheers! :drink:

Hopefully all will be well with the upcoming trials, but even if the current ones fail the WHO's approval, it'll only get revised until it does with demand exponentially increasing, which again, is only a good thing.

What i dont want though is the government forcing smaller doses that make them pointless as both NRT's and "alternatives" to the cancer stick. there's not really alot in them anyway, when you consider one "strong" cartridge is 18mg and supposedly lasts about as long as a packet, that's not alot of nicotine for each time you need to releave the craving.

i think we'll be seeing these more and more especially after the recent media interest. I do think though that the government might force us to use blue or non-orange LED's, so you can easily distinguish them from the real thing, which isn't a bad thing... i'm looking forward to the odd looks and attention i'll get from smoking a *** with a blue "ember" hahaha.

 

[BrewStew]

from what i've read the Propylene Glycol is already known to be safe for consumption, but studies have yet to be made regarding it's inhalation as a vapour.

And you will be sharing this vapour with your co-workers

it's about 5% of what was inhaled, and of that 5% it's mostly Glycol, and a tiny portion of nicotine, mixing with the air to barely detectable rates almost instantly.

barely detecable i assume means nearly nothing

 

[BrewStew]

have you ever been to a club with a smoke machine Buzz? it's the same glycol mixed in those, and they pump out HUGE amounts of the stuff, i believe they're classed as "safe"

 

[Buzz]

have you ever been to a club with a smoke machine Buzz? it's the same glycol mixed in those, and they pump out HUGE amounts of the stuff, i believe they're classed as "safe"

Indeed I have but, it was my choice to enter the said establishment

I'm only playing devils advocate. If it's barely detectable, I guess the potential to harm must be next to nothing.

 

[BrewStew]

devils advocate is cool with me. as a smoker i'm kinda used to it.

if i seemed to get a bit shirty on those last two posts it's cause i thought you were accusing me of being thoughtless in making others breathe my "vapour" hehe wow that feels weird to say.

In truth i'm really conscious of smoking real cigs, never smoke around littlern. if i've got a non smoker in my OWN car, i ask them if they mind if i smoke... so it got a little under my skin.. perhaps i read it wrong... i'm sorry.

I've tried, and will continue to read and update myself as to the healthyness of the glycerol, and as far as i can tell it seems safe in the kind of quantities i'll be puffing on. in any case though and in the avoidance of doubt i will still try not to blow vapour close to someone, as it's kind of a habit from real smoking for politeness now anyway. if it does carry some risk later down the line, hopefully the only person i'll have risked is me :)

 

[Buzz]

No offence taken Brewstew, good to see a smoker who is genuinely concerned about what they are doing. :thumb:

 

[BrewStew]

Cheers :drink:

i'll keep you posted on anything i find. the e-cig will be posted today so should get it tomorrow or saturday. i'll record a vid and post it on youtube if it's short enough (i believe youtube has a 10 min limit which wont be enough time).

it doesn't look like there are alot of e-cigs shown on youtube that speak of the potential risks. so i might touch on it in the vid to make people aware that yes, it's not illegal, but people whom do use it in non smoking areas should be polite and careful about it just incase

 

[BrewStew]

i think i've found probably one of the better videos describing the e-cig that's not trying to sell a particular brand. doesn't touch on the potential issues of the glycol though

clicky

that's not the effeminate model i bought though hehe

 

[BrewStew]

WOW... that's all i can say about Propylene Glycol!

According to This Link the stuff is in nearly every cosmetic and health and skin care product on the market. For a second i thought it was an outdated text and thought "yeah right" but i just checked all my products. to name a few common big named ones:

Brylcreem hair gel
Lynx deoderant
gillete shaving gel

but worryingly of all of them... Johnson's Baby wipes!!!!

so for all you non smokers out there worried about the health risks of passive e-smoking if it kicks off.... your already having the stuff through your skin!!!! :shock:

 

[delboy]

Agreed PEG is a pretty ubiquitous compound useful for all sorts of things.

 

[BrewStew]

it certainly appears so

wikipedia says this:

Prolonged contact with propylene glycol is essentially non-irritating to the skin. Undiluted propylene glycol is minimally irritating to the eye, and can produce slight transient conjunctivitis (the eye recovers after the exposure is removed). Exposure to mists may cause eye irritation, as well as upper respiratory tract irritation.[7] Inhalation of the propylene glycol vapors appears to present no significant hazard in ordinary applications. However, limited human experience indicates that inhalation of propylene glycol mists could be irritating to some individuals. Therefore inhalation exposure to mists of these materials should be avoided. Some research has suggested that propylene glycol not be used in applications where inhalation exposure or human eye contact with the spray mists of these materials is likely, such as fogs for theatrical productions or antifreeze solutions for emergency eye wash stations.

so on one hand, it says it's fine, but on the other inhalation is generally not as recommended, probably because certain individuals suffer allergic reactions like headaches or asthma problems.

as i'm an asthmatic (yes i know its a cardinal sin to smoke when asthmatic tut-tut to myself hehe) i think i'll have my inhaler to hand on the first go just incase. but there are other versions of the e-juice available in vegetable glycol to try if that's the case... i'll look up the risks to that too later.