If you’re a cigarette smoker and thinking about quitting, you’re not the only one.

Almost 70% of smokers say that they want to quit.

Quitting smoking is one of the best things you can do for your overall health. Tobacco smoke harms the heart, lungs, and nearly every other organ in the body, meaning that kicking the habit will let your vital organs heal.

Quitting cigarettes can be really hard, and you may be thinking about turning to electronic cigarettes (e-cigs) to help you wean yourself off. But is vaping e-cigs really a better alternative? Can they really help you stop smoking completely?

Read on to learn more!

How do e-cigs actually work?

E-cigs heat nicotine extracted from tobacco, flavorings, and other chemicals to create an aerosol or vapor that you can inhale.

Traditional cigarettes have over 7000 chemicals, and over 250 of those chemicals are confirmed to be carcinogenic. Although we don’t fully know all the chemicals inside e-cigs, many doctors agree that there are likely fewer chemicals due to the lack of combustion and tobacco.

With that being said, the past few years have seen a dramatic increase in lung-related injuries, and even some deaths related to vaping. In early 2020, the CDC reported almost 3000 lung-related injuries and nearly 70 deaths all linked to vaping.

However, although these injuries and deaths were linked to vaping, the cases seemed only to affect people who modified their e-cigs, purchased sketchy e-liquid (the juice used in e-cigs) from the black market, or modified e-liquids. This is especially true for those who purchased THC vaporizers from the black market.

Furthermore, the CDC also identified the chemical vitamin E acetate as one of the leading causes of e-cig-related lung injuries and deaths. This chemical is used as a thickening agent and can be found in many black-market THC vape pens. Vitamin e acetate was found in all the lungs of every person who experienced a lung-related injury or death.

It is recommended across all medical organizations that you:

• do not use THC e-cigs or THC vape products
• refrain from using unreliable sources like online vendors and referrals from a friend or family member
• do not use different substances in your e-cig or modify your e-cig

Additionally, a study was published in late 2021 stating that thousands of chemicals were found inside of e-cigs. The scary part? Many of them have yet to be identified. Some that were recognized were caffeine and two pesticides that have already been found as toxic and linked to respiratory issues.

One of the primary chemicals in both cigarettes and e-cigarettes is nicotine, and as many smokers already know, it’s incredibly addictive.

Nicotine causes the user to crave cigarette smoke and e-cig vapor, leaving the individual to experience withdrawal symptoms if the craving is ignored.

Nicotine is considered a toxic chemical. It causes a user to experience blood pressure and adrenal spikes, giving a smoker a higher chance of suffering a heart attack.

So, is vaping bad for you? There are many things that still need to be researched about e-cigs and the chemicals that are in them, as well as the long-term effects on your physical health. At the very least, people still need to know that they can be potentially dangerous.

New research suggests vaping could be linked to chronic lung issues, asthma, and cardiovascular disease. Vaping exposes you to chemicals that are still unknown to medical professionals, which means that they are probably not good for you.

Regular cigarettes and e-cigs both contain nicotine which may be as addictive as cocaine and heroin, some research reports.

Additionally, many e-cigs deliver more nicotine to the user than a cigarette would. The average cigarette has 10-12 milligrams of nicotine in it, and not all of it is inhaled because it is constantly burning.

Compare that number to the wildly popular JUUL e-cig, where a single pod containing 0.7 milliliters of e-liquid has the same amount of nicotine as a whole pack of cigarettes combined. Granted, each hit does not deliver a pack’s worth of nicotine to the user, but the e-liquid does not consistently burn like a cigarette and maintains its amount of nicotine until it’s empty.

Some e-cigs also allow you to increase the voltage of the battery, leading to stronger, higher dosages of nicotine in each hit.

Now that it’s over halfway through 2022, almost all of us have seen some kind of advertisement that labels e-cigs as a way to help you quit smoking.

Although this can be true for some people, especially if they are regularly lowering the amount of nicotine in their e-liquids, e-cigs have not received any kind of Food and Drug Administration approval as a cessation device. This means they have not been federally recognized as a reasonable way to quit cigarettes.

One recent study has even found that using e-cigs to quit cigarettes only resulted in the user continuing to use cigarettes and e-cigs at the same time.

With the sudden increase in lung-related injuries and deaths in 2020, the CDC recommends that people using e-cigs think about the potential risks of their use. They offered a list of FDA-approved smoking cessation devices, and some of them include nicotine gum, nicotine patches, nicotine inhalers, and nicotine nasal spray. You can learn more about these options and more by clicking here.

With all these downsides mentioned about vaping, are there any positives to it?

Comparing cigarettes to e-cigs, they are significantly safer than standard tobacco products. In fact, The British Royal College of Physicians and Public Health England and the American National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine have all concluded that vaping is more than 90% less harmful than smoking.

This statistic comes from the fact that e-cigs have no combustion which results in the production of tar and carbon monoxide, two incredibly toxic byproducts of tobacco smoke. The lack of these toxic byproducts means that the heart, lungs, and sense of taste will work at a higher level of functioning compared to a cigarette smoker, however, they will not work as efficiently as someone who is completely smoke and vapor-free.

Another advantage is that you, your clothes, and your surroundings will not smell like smoke. Vapor from an e-cig has a smell, but it doesn’t stick to its surrounding area like tobacco smoke because it lacks the stickiness that tar causes.

Even if you choose tobacco-flavored vape juice, it still won’t smell like burnt tobacco. For many people, the smell of e-cig vapor is barely noticeable, and it’s usually the cloud of vapor that people notice before anything else.

Vaping offers the user complete control over how much nicotine they are using. E-liquids range from all kinds of levels of nicotine, and some contain no nicotine at all. Many people that switch to vapes start with a high level of nicotine, and as time progresses they gradually work their way down.

You can also control the amount of vapor that you exhale. Many people nowadays are resorting to pod-based devices (like the JUUL or Vuse Alto) because of their relatively low vapor output. There is also a population of professional vapers, and many of them like to use box mods (lithium battery-powered devices) so they can achieve large amounts of vapor to pull off different kinds of tricks.

These kinds of devices also let you adjust airflow, the kinds of coils used, and the power output which can change the strength of your hit, as well as the taste of your flavoring.

Speaking of flavors, there is essentially any kind you can think of. Some of the most popular flavors include fruit, mint, menthol, tobacco, and more. If you get the right ingredients, you can even make your own vape juice at home.

Finally, vaping is far more cost effective than traditional cigarettes. You could spend a few bucks on a vape, or choose to spend hundreds on a high-end set up. Whatever you end up choosing, there is an option for you.

As you can see, there are too many uncertainties around vaping to say that it is safe. However, if you are a regular smoker looking to quit, vaping could be a beneficial option for you as it’s better than traditional cigarettes and offers options for you to wean yourself off nicotine.

If you are not already a smoker, there is no need for you to start vaping. The chemicals aren’t fully known, the research shows that there are still dramatic effects on the cardiovascular and respiratory systems, and e-cigs are still just as addictive as regular tobacco products.

The best way for you to improve your health is to quit smoking/vaping entirely, and you’ll begin to notice improvements in as little as three days. If you are in need of help while you quit smoking, reach out to Brooks Healing Center to get in touch with one of our trained medical professionals.