In the collective imagination the idea persists that vape It is healthier than smoking conventional cigarettes. The industry has inoculated this idea and using vapes has become fashionable, they are so “sexy” for young people as it was, a few years ago, to smoke a cigarette, as the Secretary of State for Health, Javier Padilla, warned this week.
However, doctors, from oncologists to pediatricians, have taken advantage of the fact that this Friday marks World No Tobacco Day to warn about their harmful effects. The Spanish Society of Medical Oncology (SEOM) has highlighted that electronic cigarettes can cause lung cancer even with shorter exposure time than conventional tobacco.
“Although the observation time is short, and the evidence is therefore limited, the new forms of vaping so widespread in youthsare positioned as a potential cause of lung cancer that results in the appearance of this disease even with shorter exposure time than with conventional tobacco. We must not forget that in many cases the electronic cigarette or vaping, associated with safety, constitutes the entrance door or the first contact with conventional tobacco,” explains Rosario García Campelo, member of the SEOM Board of Directors and head of the Oncology Service of the University Hospital Complex of A Coruña (CHUAC).
A study published in 2019 in the US observed a high number of admissions of young people with lung injuries associated with vaping
As electronic cigarettes have only been on the market for a short time – they began to be marketed in Spain in 2013 – there are still no long-term studies on the diseases they can cause. But there are indications or short-term studies, such as the one published in 2019 in the United States that observed a high number of youth income with lung injuries associated with vaping, specifically 2,807 admissions and 68 deaths. The researchers attributed the harmful effects to substances that electronic cigarettes contain such as vitamin E acetate.
In turn, vape aerosols contain more than 200 toxic substances and some of them carcinogenic, as the Spanish Society of Epidemiology (SEE) warned this week.
Children and adolescents
While the pediatricians They have placed the emphasis on “trivialization” of vaping among children and adolescents, given that, as they have confirmed in their talks at schools, “vapers can be found in backpacks” of children of eight or nine years old. “There are not only vapers in the shape of well-known comic or movie characters. Cartoon, is that some are made in such a way that they are confused with school supplies. They are shaped like highlighters, pencil sharpeners… You don’t have to be very discerning to think that this is done to attract minors, from an early age, and also so that they camouflage themselves from the sight of educators,” warns Carmen Fidalgosecretary of the Board of Directors of the Spanish Association of Primary Care Pediatrics (AEPap).
Half of the students between 14 and 18 years old – 54.6% – have used electronic cigarettes at some time, which represents the largest increase in the historical series
There are no official data on the consumption of electronic cigarettes among children, since the survey of the National Plan against Drugs of the Ministry of Health is carried out in high schools, among adolescents and young people aged 14 and 18. However, the latest edition, published in 2023, already warned that more than half of the students of those ages – specifically 54.6% – have consumed electronic cigarettes at some point, which represents an increase of 10 percentage points compared to 2021, the highest recorded in the historical series.
In the younger population, vaping is more widespread than conventional tobacco. That same survey indicates that 26% of students admit to having vaped in the last 30 days, compared to 21% who have smoked cigarettes.
The Government’s plan
Aware of this situation, the Government plans toughen the law to equate conventional tobacco with new forms of consumption, to prevent electronic devices from being sold in any type of store and there are similar restrictions regarding advertising. This measure is part of the Comprehensive Smoking Prevention and Control Plan, which also contemplates other measures to reduce tobacco consumption such as expanding the number of spaces banned from smoke or the neutral packaging of the boxes.
The Spanish Society of Oncology has warned this Thursday that tobacco is the cause of 30% of different types of cancer, such as lung, head, neck, bladder or esophagus. And it is also related to diseases non-oncological conditions such as chronic bronchitis, pulmonary emphysema, coronary heart disease, stroke or gastrointestinal ulcers, increasing the risk of dying prematurely by 70%.