Vape News In Brief: February 26th, 2018 Edition

*VNIB* is a semi-regular column in which we take a look around the globe, searching for news, science, and the occasional pop culture reference related to vaping and the life of vapers. Today, let's talk about…

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The Food and Drug Administration is hiring independent contractors to conduct in-person inspections of brick-and-mortar vape shops and ensure compliance with federal law. One thing they'll be checking is to ensure there are no sales of 'new products' that haven't been approved – using the existing 2007 predicate date means they'll likely find violations wherever they land…

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Looking for oversimplified advice for performing party tricks with your vapor clouds? The kind that will probably confuse you as much as it helps? Just in case, we've got you covered.

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New survey data suggests that almost one in five high school students are active users of vapor products, at least according to this piece. That's certainly cause for alarm in a state where smoking rates are actually below the national average – lawmakers are reacting with a proposal to raise the minimum age to purchase tobacco and vapor products from 18 to 21.

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This Alabama student op-ed argues that JUUL shouldn't market their product as 'a safe alternative to smoking cigarettes with all the same head-rushing inducing nicotine pleasure.' Okay, sure – advertising any vapor product as 'safe,' or glorifying 'head-rushing inducing nicotine pleasure' (about as real as the claim is grammatically correct) is bad. But JUUL doesn't do that – and the article even admits as much before re-assembling the straw man for another wicked takedown…

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La Salle County in Illinois is preparing to ban smoking in and around public housing. That's to comply with a federal Housing and Urban Development directive that takes effect in July. But while they're at it, they've also added a vaping ban for good measure 'because many housing agencies believe it is next on HUD's to-do list.' It's always unfortunate when vaping gets lumped in with smoking in use restrictions – this might have been a great opportunity to encourage smokers to quit, and it would have been sensible given that vapor dissipates in seconds, as compared to smoke that can linger for 20 minutes, long after it's visible, and get sucked through common ventilation shafts into neighboring units.

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Burying the lede: in what's possibly the biggest news we'll cover this edition, the American Cancer Society has softened its stance on vaping. While they're still not delivering a glowing endorsement, the fact is that science proves vaping, while not as low-risk as not vaping, is considerably better than smoking. And acknowledgement of that fact from a former enemy of vapor products is a huge step toward helping more people quit tobacco.

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You hear this from us often enough (we've already touched on the topic once in this post), but it's nice to see well-written arguments published in mainstream sources making the case for regulating vapor products and tobacco products as distinct categories. Like this one.

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The vapor industry is facing yet another round of lawsuits, these originating in California, from users who burned themselves after sending their device batteries into thermal meltdown. No word on what kind of hardware is involved, but one defendant appears to be LG Chem, the Korean battery manufacturer that does not advocate for the use of its cells in vapor hardware – they're mistakenly referenced here as a mod manufacturer.

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Vaping while driving isn't illegal in the UK, but that won't stop cops there from pursuing punishment against vapers they catch doing it. As a post last week recounted, an exhaled vapor cloud that doesn't go out a window can temporarily obstruct a driver's vision, resulting in unsafe driving practices. Such a distraction, if observed, could land motorists a 'driving without due care and attention' charge.

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Potentially worrisome: yet another new study looking at vaping is making the rounds. This one suggests that toxic metals were found in some tested vapor. This is of course a concern, regardless, but there are several caveats, as some helpful commenters to the article point out. First, the metal seems to come from the tank or the coil, not the e-liquid. Second, the tested devices were used in voltage mode, which doesn't give an accurate idea without having the coil resistance to tell whether the devices were mishandled. There's also a question of inhale technique, and a failure to differentiate between different coil materials (nickel coils, for example, are entirely unsafe to use in voltage mode). If further research can show that, when used reasonably, devices are still emitting toxic particulate, we need to test extensively what coil materials and temperature settings are causing the harm (which was far from uniform across the spectrum of tested devices) in order to change the way people vape. We're not there yet, though.

We'll call that a wrap for this week, but we'll be back…sometime…with more to share. Thanks for reading!