Smoking vs Vaping: What Are You Inhaling and Who Wants to Regulate "for your safety?"

Cigarettes have a plethora of nasty chemicals and their effects are know. Included in that list is ammonia, formaldehyde, urea, lead, and benzene. Ejuice, the liquid used in ecigs, is nicotine, propylene glycol (PG), Vegetable Glycerin (VG), and flavor additives that have been approved for consumption by The Food and Drug Administration (FDA). In fact, PG and VG are also approved additives. Smoking also produces carbon monoxide, which is not produced by vaping. Obviously, vaping is not as good for you as breathing in just air. Vaping still produces, although at mostly very low levels, some harmful chemicals are still produced. The aerosol contains metal particles, but no where near the levels of cigarettes.

If one looks at the research literature on ecigs, the overwhelming conclusions are that they are significantly less harmful than smoking, but that more studies need to be done. Some studies have found controversial findings, such as one that generated formaldehyde at very high temperatures, but that study was debunked since it was only produced at high heat levels that vapes don't use. In other words, it was produced in a non real world condition. Another chemical that was found in ejuice was diacetyl, a butter flavoring used for popcorn and famously linked to "popcorn lung," which is irreversible. However, if one looks at ingredients from most ejuice manufacturers now, it is stated explicitly that diacetyl is not used. Studies on second hand vapor and environmental air quality show chemical levels are negligible, but PG can irritate someone's nasal passages, eyes, and sometimes lungs, although surprisingly, it's used in asthma inhalers as well as prescription nicotine inhalers. One needs to keep in mind that some of the studies producing negative results are funded by big tobacco.

This is a new industry and the chemicals used are approved for consumption but not inhalation, so not enough is known at this point and more research needs to be done. In England, where ecigs have been available much longer, it was concluded that their use is a significant benefit to public health over cigarettes and that they are 95% safer to use.  Not vaping and just breathing in air is obviously better, but vaping is significantly less harmful than smoking, by leaps and bounds, in fact. The general conclusion is that it's not harmless, but an incredible harm reduction for smokers and is causing a major shift that tobacco companies are feeling the effects of to the point where they're doing more research on and acquiring ecig brands, as well as developing their own.

There are strong political implications on many levels here. Vaping is often regulated for use the same way as cigarettes despite them being insignificant in affecting air quality. In California, it was decided that they should be treated as cigarettes, along with an alarmist public health article, but when I looked at the citations, the presence of harmful chemicals inhaled/exhaled was mostly negligible and in 9 to 750 times less the concentration than in cigarettes. Since effects of inhaling the ingredients are not known, there's often a paranoid outlook of "We should ban them because we don't know what's in them" and "What about the children?" If you're afraid of something that could be harmful, but the long term effects are not known, that's similar to thinking one shouldn't drive because it's dangerous or one shouldn't go outside because it's a big, bad, scary world out there, so xenophobia reigns supreme. Clearly, there is a concern about teenagers using ecigs and they do come in flavors like bubblegum and gummy bears, so that attraction is understandable, but it's not taken into account that kids experiment with drugs both legal and illegal and will always do so.

There's also a push towards regulating the vaping industry. Most of the equipment comes from China and there are no production standards to prevent making products that don't work or are dangerous, but the industry and users often rate the products and are not shy about letting others know which brands are reliable and which aren't. This also is reasonable since they are selling products with nicotine and there's no regulation on the ingredients for inhalation purposes or how they're made, but regulation requirements are costly. Stores and manufacturers would have to register their formulas for each flavor with The FDA, which is expensive enough that it would cause the stores and manufacturers to go out of business, which would leave only big tobacco left to make and market the devices and ejuice. Addictive additives have been added to tobacco products and the amounts have increased over the past ten years, so they're far more addictive now than they were ten years ago and there's no requirement for them to remove those additives, so one could easily conclude that if the only people with enough money to keep items on the shelf are big tobacco, they're likely to add those chemicals to their ecig products, too and without having to list them.

This issue is framed as a libertarian or conservative cause since it involves small businesses and potential obstacles to their success while supposed liberal entities are trying to make things safe for everyone. I'm politically liberal and feel that more objective approaches can be made to legislation that will ensure smaller businesses can prosper. Additionally, the alarmist responses have treated the few studies so far in a non-objective matter that isn't relevant to real world scenarios. Saying "they've got formaldehyde and are a threat to public health" when that's only produced with a non real world scenario is not objective, nor is a study claiming they cause cells in a petri dish to die 24 hours later but not noting that they die almost immediately when exposed to cigarette smoke is not objective.

It's understandable the one shouldn't vape in closed spaces like airplanes and small spaces since the chemicals can irritate people and are unpleasant to smell sometimes, but the outlook that they're nearly as harmful as cigarettes could discourage people from quitting smoking, which has larger implications in public health policy and cost.

Making enough Vapor and Finding The Perfect Vape Set Up That Works

So thing worked. I hadn't smoked for a few weeks, had at least a month of ejuice, and was able to make smoke from my equipment, but it didn't feel like enough smoke. All About Vapor offered an Aspire Premium Kit as a starter kit for $75. Given I already spent money on vaping stuff, it seemed too steep, but I was able to find someone on craigslist selling one for 50. I bought it. It was perfect! Lots of vapor, it felt solid in my hand, but not too big. After having it for a day or two, I was really comfortable and realized I wasn't going to smoke again. Hello world, I'm NOT a smoker!

The smoke generated from it was satisfying. She also gave me a bottle of Sherpa, which tasted like rainbow sherbet, and a bottle of Bearded Bastard, which tasted like a smooth custard. There are 7000 different varieties of ejuice and numerous flavors. I honestly thought it was silly and odd. Why vape a flavor instead of the real thing? And honestly, who wants fruity pebbles in aerosol form? (one actually produces aerosol while vaping. Vapor itself describes conversion from liquid to gas at a high temperature, like steam given off from boiling water, so actual vapor is too hot to inhale). Then again, my taste preference is towards savory food and not sweets. I'll hopefully have a chance to review more flavors though, so I'm keeping an open mind. I recently tried green apple flavored ejuice and really liked it, in fact. I bought another one from Austin City Vapors so I could have one to use while the other one was charging.

 I still wanted that tobacco taste since I was used to it, but tobacco flavored ejuice is supposedly similar to what tobacco tastes like, which a cigarette has a tobacco flavor, but it's more of a burnt taste. My personal experience was that I liked the tobacco's strength and duplication of smoking, but a smooth "finish" or addition to it made it more pleasant, so custard, cream, butterscotch, caramel, and vanilla flavors worked best for me since they were warm and not overpowering. The fruit flavor wasn't for me. I either used Bail Jumper from All About Vapor, mixed the straight tobacco flavors with Bearded Bastard or a butterscotch flavor that I found for a dollar at Austin City Vapors. The also gave me samples of RY4, which is a tobacco with a caramel finish, and cinnamon roll, which had a strong flavor that I felt silly vaping, but mixed well with other tobacco flavors and gave the vape a nice flavored finish or aftertaste.

Feeling Positive Effects of Quitting Smoking, Blowing "Smoke," and That Tobacco Taste.

It didn't take long after quitting smoking for my taste buds to come back. Suddenly, food tasted very different. It was a new experience, so I started eating more, but kept my weight to the same. I stopped wheezing and could breath better, my heart rate went down, which was especially noticeable when I rode my bike and saw on the computer that my heart rate averaged 20bpm less. Wow! More stamina, my chest didn't hurt when I exerted myself, and I could breath in! I was also able to sleep with my mouth closed and the acid reflux and heartburn that I had daily and took Nexium for was seriously alleviated. It turns out smoking causes you to produce more stomach acid.

I also started coughing up phlegm mixed with brown nodules (yuck). That's the norm when one quits smoking. Your lungs clean out the tar as they're clearing up and cilia grows back. My circulation increased also.

After a week with my new set up and the ejuice, the Major Leagues started to taste too harsh. Were my taste buds coming back? It was also a little bit uncomfortable on the throat. Although all sales are final on house made ejuice, All About Vapor allowed me to trade in one unopened bottle of Major Leagues for Bail Jumper. Since I noticed that the attraction was blowing out "smoke" and not the nicotine, I had the level on the new bottle at 24mg nicotine. 

E-juice and A Vape Pen Upgrade That Produced More Vapor

Vaping costs less than smoking. By far, but e-juice costs vary. I went back to All About Vapor since they were not only closest to my house, but had a special on buy three in house juices and get one free. I asked the salesperson about trying other flavors to see how they taste since Major League was working for me, but didn't feel "smooth." He gave me two other flavors to try: Sweet Blend, which had a mild sweetness to it,  and Bail jumper, which had kind of a smooth, hazelnut finish to my taste. I got two 30ml bottles of Major League, one bottle of Sweet Blend, and one bottle of Bail Jumper.

For trying them out, he gave me a set-up that was really different from what I had: The cartomizer and clearomizer were bigger, but the draw was easier and it produced more smoke, so I asked about them. The technology advanced in leaps and bounds since I bought my last kit, but still was looking to save money, so he showed me the Aspire CF VV atomizer and the Aspire CE5 BVC clearomizer.

The draw was much easier and it blew out more smoke. The taste of the juice was a lot stronger, also. The atomizer had variable voltage that one could adjust at the bottom, which adjust the temperature of "the hit" as well as the amount of vapor produced.

I liked them, but asked about other options, so he showed me their new starter kit, which was an Aspire Premium Kit that comes with an atomizer, a clearmizer called the Aspire Nautilus Mini, a charging cable, plug-in charger, and an extra five replacement coils for the clearomizer. Wanting to ultimately save money not knowing yet about vaping technology, and looking at something that seemed a little silly at the time in its size, I went with the battery separately and two CE5's for half the cost of the kit. After trying them out, I felt empowered and knew that I could now choose not to smoke cigarettes anymore.

Ok. Really Going To Quit This Time

About three years after buying the starter kit, I found myself unemployed and living a sparser existence. One day, I didn't have any money for smokes, so I got out the starter kit and started sucking on a vape. Heavily. It was not like smoking, but it still had the ritual of smoking and after doing it enough, too much, actually, it felt somewhat satisfying. After a day, my asthma improved a little and I started wheezing less. Food also started to taste better, but I still wanted to smoke and missed that specific feeling. I was also out of fluid, which costs a little more than a pack of smokes. I bought a pack of smokes four days after quitting, lit up, and resolved to go get more e-juice the next day and not smoke again.

Making A First Investment In Quitting With A Vape Pen Starter Kit

About a year after that experience, I noticed stores that sold e cigarettes called "vape stores" opening up. When I went out, I noticed people using gadgets to "smoke." They didn't look like cigarettes, but they blew out a good amount of smoke and it looked like they enjoyed them. I spoke to some people and they said it felt like smoking and they were happy with it, so I went to the nearest store that I knew of, All about Vapor.

The inside looked like a clinic. It was a lot of floor space, a few tables and chairs, and a counter on one wall. It seemed like a lot of space for just buying ecigs. I took a number and sat down. Once called, an employee introduced himself and asked me a lot of questions about my smoking habits and what I smoked. He showed me a starter kit made by Joytech and explained the different parts to me. I picked out the atomizer and case color as green since that's my favorite color.

The kit consisted of two atomizers, a charging cable and plug for charging them, and three cartomizers, which are cylinders that hold the e-juice, wick, and heating coils. They refilled by unscrewing the drip tip and refilling the cylinder with e-juice. It works by the wicks soaking up the e-juice, then drawing it up to a heating coil at the tip, which heats up the fluid to a vapor which is inhaled.

It was a pretty cool device, and the customer service from All About Vapor was amazing. They worked with me for nearly an hour assessing my habits, how it works, and how to use it and refill it. They also gave me a 30ml bottle of Major League, and e-juice made to closely resemble Marlboro 27, which is what I smoked. 

It blew out smoke, felt like holding a cigarette, only larger, and it had a taste. It looked like it would work.

This worked for a lot of people. It blew out smoke and resembled smoking. I didn't catch on to it, though. It still required a stronger draw, so it didn't feel exactly like smoking. That's something one needs to understand: One is vaping, not smoking, so it's not going to be exactly the same. I tried it on and off as a substitute for a few days and eventually, put the kit away and kept smoking only and procrastinating on quitting, despite spending money on something with the purpose of quitting smoking and saving money by not buying cigarettes.

First Experiences with Ecigs

I started to seriously consider quitting when my life was stable since one always has the excuse that smoking relieves stress and one considers to quit when everything in their life was okay. That's what I did at first. I tried the patch, gum, hypnosis, and Chantix. None of them helped. Simply put, the act and the ritual of smoking was too attractive. I liked the feeling of inhaling, the taste, and smoke blowing out. A few people at work had electronic cigarettes that at the time, could only be ordered from China, but they seemed realistic when they used them. They looked like cigarettes and blew smoke out. They also were stored in a box that looked like a pack of cigarettes, so there was the ritual, but it's not smoking. Obviously, that's pretty attractive.

I found some e-cigs locally. They were designed to look like cigarettes and even had a glow at the end.

They looked like the real thing. I guess they tasted like it, too. They had that strong, burnt smell of cigarettes. The white part is the battery, also called an atomizer. The filter screws into it and holds the heating element and e-juice, which is the flavoring. It didn't work for me. When I smoked it like a cigarette, it burned my throat and made me cough. To use it, one has to smoke it more like a cigar by taking a puff into one's mouth, then waiting a second before inhaling, then exhale. The other major failure is that once has to take a really strong suck on it to get anything out of it, so it was not like smoking at all and thus, didn't work for me.