Having smoked and vaped both nicotine and cannabis, my experience is that cannabis vape is much harsher than nicotine vape. The cannabis concentrate is a solid or waxy consistency at room temp while nicotine extract is a liquid. This means that solvents and/or oils are needed to get the cannabis to liquid before it gets to vapor. When vaping cannabis cartridges they generally don’t smell much like cannabis, which causes me to suspect imperfect distillation, with residual nasties. This is all name brand cartridges from legal dispensaries which have lab test results indicating thc and cbd. After a few bad experiences with no name or house brand cartridges that cost less, tasting just nasty, I only consider the expensive reputable brands. Would never buy on the street.
This is different from nicotine vapor liquid, where there is no distillation involved. Just flavor, nicotine, and propylene glycol and/or vegetable glycerine. I still pay more for top brands and taste a minor difference but it is nowhere near the difference in quality and taste in bad vs good cannabis vape cartridges.
For me there is no doubt just based on the experience that vaping nicotine is much more healthy than smoking tobacco. With cannabis I am not ready to make any judgements about smoke vs vape health.
It’s inconclusive. Vitamin E has been linked to some, but not all of the illnesses. One of the problems is they have 100 samples from 215 patients, and Vitamin E has been found in just 13 samples.
The state Department of Health said in a news release that “very high levels” of the compound had been found in 13 samples from eight of 34 patients who have gotten ill in New York. The samples were analyzed as part of an investigation by the Wadsworth Center, a state laboratory.
This finding by no means ends the search for what is causing the illnesses, particularly given that vitamin E acetate has not been confirmed as a factor in the majority of cases in which patients have gotten sick in New York.
“That’s the best theory, or hypothesis, we have right now,” Dr. Howard Zucker, the New York State health commissioner, said in an interview. “We haven’t ruled out there isn’t something else in the vaping material.”
The only advice seems to be “avoid black market stuff”
I’m reminded of an announcement about the discover of a new “most carcinogenic material” some years ago. The previous holder of the title was a by-product of burning diesel oil. The new holder was a by-product of the previous substance. Its fucking carcinogens all the way down, a never-ending cavalcade of chaotic cancerous shit.
Meh. Smoking/vaping is more about oral gratification than “something to do with your hands”. The “hit” it gives with each drawback - even though it is deleterious to your health and lungs - gives automatic feedback - that yeah, you’re alive - and of course nicotine and some other substances are addictive. Chew on a pen or pencil - whoops, what are they? We’re in the digital age now. Need to find something to do with your hands? Practice card tricks. Suck on an UNLIT cigar. You need not pretend you need to indulge in destructive behavior simply because you have ADHD. We used to joke about cannabis being addictive. I had a mate used to say “I’ve been smoking dope for 20 years and I’m not addicted!”. I did better than 40 years. It took years for my lungs to recover. At least my internal voice doesn’t nag me to stop anymore.
This article is a lot more specific about a great many things. It speculates that Honey Cut may well be the adulterant at fault.
Disinger said in-house lab tests done by True Terpenes on Honey Cut led company officials to suspect a substance known as tocopherol-acetate, usually found in skin creams. The National Institutes of Health database Pubchem.com states that inhaling tocopherol-acetate can cause wheezing, coughing, shortness of breath, and burning in the mouth, throat or chest, and could potentially lead to hospitalization.
Perhaps more relevant is this assurance.
Most importantly, no cases are associated with adult-use or medical cannabis products from legal state-licensed stores. Almost all affected states do not have adult-use legalization in effect. They include Connecticut, Illinois, Indiana, Iowa, Minnesota, Michigan, North Carolina, New Jersey, New Mexico, New York, Pennsylvania, Texas, Utah, and Wisconsin. Additional states are pending verification. The California incidents occurred in Kings County, which has banned licensed cannabis stores.
They may well be leaping to conclusions which cannot be supported by the available evidence. Nonetheless. Interesting.
Sure it can’t be good, but it doesn’t mean that there are different levels of bad. I’ve read studies with comparisons of various carcinogen content in e-cigarettes and regular cigarettes and the difference was massive.
Here’s one of the studies, focusing on acrylamide and acrolein (both are carcinogens): https://www.researchgate.net/publication/271922968_Determination_of_Acrylamide_and_Acrolein_in_Smoke_from_Tobacco_and_E-Cigarettes
Interesting thins is that acrolein content for different e-cigarette brand varies by about 2200%. Some brands (“One-off E-cigarette–Marlboro flavor”) are nearly as bad as cigarettes (concerning acrolein, there was no acrylamide detected in e-cigarette smoke), while some are incomparably better.
It’s still better to avoid both regular and e-cigarettes.
yeah, that phrasing in that context…its like some sort of “positive” denialism framing; a more honest formulating would be “it may not be as unhealthy as (…), but still not healthy at all.”
Man! chemistry is hard outside of a beaker. Total black magic. The science is good enough to explain what found, but it’s not that great at telling you what happened in the field. Best option is to ask a biologist to dissect some specimens and send swabs.
Cannabis extracts around here are typically super critical co2 extracted, and have no solvents or additives at all. they are sold for special vapes that are meant to handle these concentrates. very pure material straight from the plant, spectrographically analized for contaminates like metals, exact concentration of compounds listed. you can even get 99.9% pure thc or cbd as white powder. so you aren’t getting anything unknown or different from smoking, just not any of the undesirables. here in canada, cannabis vapes are worlds healthier than nicotine vapes, and both are healthier than smoking.
nicotine vapes on the other hand are typically a concoction of glycerin or propylene glycol, chemicals for flavors, and some sort of nicotine solution. it is usually the additives that cause issue, like diacetyl causing popcorn lung, or lipids causing lipoid pneumonia. i think you need to use more care when dealing with these concoctions and be educated as to their formulations.
it is well know to NEVER ever add any lipids to a vape solution EVER or you will get the issue being caused by the lipids in the vitamin e, lipoid pneumonia. terpenes yes, lipids no. whomever formulated these crappy products had no idea what they were doing.
Sadly the full text of that isn’t available, but thanks. I’m going to need to rethink my assumptions about vaping. Not to the point where I pick it up as a habit though
That’s actually one of the suggested comparisons I recall seeing (I don’t have sources handy) - that vaping is (according to this source I’m just remembering so I can’t look up to try to guess at their reliability) is about as bad for your health as the difference in air quality that comes of living in a large city instead of the countryside.
The jury’s still out about whether that’s comparable in harm to a smoking habit, though. (People who smoke nicotine in highly-congested cities are already doubling their risks, of course)
Aren’t they using it as a waxy carrier? Or is the e a byproduct of the combustion of the carrier medium? Regular vaping is propylene glycol and glycerine, with nicotine and flavors. Cannabis oil vaping is configured differently. But I’m asking, not telling. How is it different?
Food grade hemp oil sometimes has vitamin E added as a preservative. Maybe they just use such oil as a base for vape fluid, not knowing what problems it may create?
I wonder why they are against vegetable glycerine (VG) and propylene glycol (PG)? People have been vaping those two carriers for decades, without a public health crisis. Do they interact with THC or something and reduce its potency?
(Wikifu, wikifu, wikifu…)
Ah! They are alcohols. Or at least in the alcohol family, whatever that means. So yes, I bet they do react with THC. That’s why they are using other diluents. Very interesting…
