Comment by mst | Hacker News Reader

Comment by mst | Hacker News Reader

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> more susceptible to any kind of tobacco

That is, of course, assuming that the e-cig uses tobacco, for which I see absolutely no evidence.

Please at least stick to the ingredients actually present when attempting an attack.

Additionallym please bear in mind that saying "oh but we've no guarantee it was actually made with those ingredients" is pretty equivalent to "oh but we've no guarantee somebody's lipstick wasn't actually made with rat poision", so your 'strawman argument' claim down thread doesn't make any sense to me.

> I understand why my mother started smoking when she was 16 and then smoked a pack a day for the next 43 years until she died from cancer.

I fear that this statement elsethread - combined with your sneering tone anc crusader's mindset - indicates that you're not actually interested in discussing the matter clearly but rather in rationalising your hatred of the thing you blame for your mother's death. That would be a shame; under the thick layer of condescension I think you actually have some valid arguments, although it's a little difficult to tell for sure.

That is, of course, assuming that the e-cig uses tobacco, for which I see absolutely no evidence.

Here's some evidence for you to see:

http://www.fda.gov/NewsEvents/PublicHealthFocus/ucm173146.ht...

Diethylene glycol was detected in one cartridge at approximately 1%. Diethylene glycol, an ingredient used in antifreeze, is toxic to humans.

Certain tobacco-specific nitrosamines which are human carcinogens were detected in half of the samples tested.

Tobacco-specific impurities suspected of being harmful to humans—anabasine, myosmine, and β-nicotyrine—were detected in a majority of the samples tested.

You appear to just be taking all the claims that these e-cigarette companies are reporting at face value. Just like people used to take what the tobacco companies said at face value. I won't fall for it.

Are e-cigarettes safe than regular cigarettes? Maybe? Probably? Are they safe though? I have no idea and neither do you or anyone else.

Finding a known toxin in one cartridge out of eighteen could be a single manufacturing error, but does indeed strike me as a potential problem.

The remaining statements give no statement of quantities or the likely effects ... so could indeed be a serious problem, or no more of a risk than background radiation.

Please consider the possibility that my refusal to take -your- claims at face value indicates a refusal to do so with anybody's claims rather than a desire to only accept evidence from one side of an argument.

> Are they safe though?

Safety can't be treated as an absolute; I know somebody who's substantially allergic to peanuts or the dust thereof, and as such could easily have a very bad reaction simply from somebody eating a bag of peanuts next to them. This is not to my knowledge commonly raised as an argument to make peanuts illegal - but seems equivalent to your "particularly susceptible to tobacco" point, unless I'm missing something.

> I have no idea

Neither do I, but I regard this as a reason not to immediately draw any specific conclusion rather than to consider anybody who makes a particular guess to be "falling for" anything.

That DEG bit has nothing to do with them using tobacco, and instead has everything to do with a company in China not using USP Propylene Glycol (as non-USP PG might contain some DEG.)

And just to elaborate on this, non-USP PG is used everywhere. If you cook and use flavorings, take a look in your cupboard and check out the ingredients. PG will no doubt be used as a carrier in some of them. Aside from flavorings it's also used in the manufacture of many foods: my grandfather, who works at a cheese house, told me they use it in their process and it no doubt gets into the production.

The nitrosamines are from the nicotine extraction, which again indicates that they were probably not using USP nicotine. The company that produced that particular e-cigarette is now out of business.

The dose makes the poision; analyze everything around you and you may find a very small percentage of unwanted and dangerous chemicals.

Conflating the e-cigarette industry with the tobacco industry is entirely incorrect. The e-cig industry was not started by a tobacco company, and big tobacco has only recently taken interest by buying up companies and starting their own brands.

Also note, that the amount of DEG and nitrosamines were well within acceptable standards enforced by the FDA. The whole media circus around it was very shady.

>The dose makes the poision; analyze everything around you and you may find a very small percentage of unwanted and dangerous chemicals.

Very good point. Toxicologists hate the term "poison" because it is misleading. Water is poisonous when we take too much.

There was some terrible anti-ecig research recently that reported all of this dangerous stuff in them (still vastly less dangerous if you look at it merely because there is no burning lignins).

Anyhow, the flaw in this study was burning e-liquid at 900 degrees C, the temperature of the cone of a burning cigarette, versus the 200-250 C of an ecig. It is sort of like saying a car isn't safe to drive on a highway because we tested it at 200 MPH.

All of these people raising concern in this thread, writing NYT articles, etc. are not informed about the body of research and able to put it in perspective.

BTW, with how much is consumed on average taken into account, FDA-approved gums/patches contain more tobacco-specific nitrosamines than ecigs (and this is so minor to not be a concern).

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