Global scholars, scientists, and doctors debate the harms of vaping

David Peyton, a chemistry professor at Portland State University, has never been attacked so strongly.

Chemistry professor Payton's research results believe that e-cigarettes produce more carcinogenic formaldehyde than cigarettes

Payton and other chemists discovered about five years ago that e-cigarettes sometimes produce more carcinogenic formaldehyde than regular cigarettes. When people light an ordinary cigarette, a chemical reaction produces formaldehyde. It is shocking that the formaldehyde content in e-cigarette vapors is so high, because e-cigarettes have long been considered a relatively safe alternative to cigarettes. In January 2015, the New England Journal of Medicine published the research results and quickly made headlines.

However, with the public's attention, a rebound quickly emerged.

The first wave of criticism came from the Internet. On the day the study was published, a social activist who supported e-cigarettes sent an open letter to Payton online questioning the study. Bloggers attacked the study as false and ineffective. Payton and his colleagues received a barrage of abusive emails in their mailboxes.

Three months later, Clive Bates, a social activist, British anti-tobacco advocate and consultant, joined forces with Konstantinos Farsalinos, a then-unknown Greek cardiologist, to send a 14-page complaint letter to the editor of the New England Journal of Medicine, calling the study grossly inaccurate and misleading and demanding that the publication be withdrawn. About 40 researchers and e-cigarette supporters signed a joint petition expressing support for the complaint.

Some of them, or the organizations to which they belong, have received funding from tobacco companies, e-cigarette companies, and e-cigarette promotion organizations.

The New England Journal of Medicine said it rarely receives petitions from third parties seeking withdrawals. The magazine published critical emails from Fasalinos and two other researchers, but did not retract the published content.

Payton said supporters of e-cigarettes do want to kill the study. ldquo; We published the research in this prestigious journal and mentioned cancer issues and added numbers. But they don't like it.& rdquo;

There are 1888 cases of electronic atomization in the United States and 37 deaths

In the debate over the safety of e-cigarettes, the situation is becoming more and more serious. Data from the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) show that as of October 29, acute lung injury related to electronic nebulization has affected 1888 people, 37 of whom have died. Most cases involved the addition of tetrahydrocannabinol (THC), the active ingredient of cannabis, to cigarette bombs. The surge in e-cigarette use among young people has panicked parents, made schools nervous, and made regulators uneasy.
  Cases of e-cigarette disease continue to rise
Even before all this happened, the discussion about the long-term impact of e-cigarettes had turned into a row.

Doctor Fasalinos becomes leader in the war on e-cigarettes

Fasalinos is a 44-year-old doctor from the University of Petrey and the Onassis Heart Surgery Center. He became a leader in the war on e-cigarettes. As a user who switched from regular cigarettes to e-cigarettes, he believes his mission is to refute flawed research. To this end, he published more than 70 research reports and correspondence emails on e-cigarettes and reducing the harm of tobacco.

He pointed out: I don't know of any scientist in the world who has published more papers in the field of e-cigarettes than me." rdquo;

Fasalinos introduced the public health benefits of e-cigarettes at a roving meeting of the Global Science Conference. He has his own column on the ecigarte-research.org website, in which he attacks research and media reports that think e-cigarettes are bad.

In a recent column, Fasalinos said the U.S. response to the outbreak of lung injury cases has been emotional, irrational hysteria. In another article, he argued that there was a political persecution against e-cigarettes and criticized a Bloomberg report on early signs of lung damage caused by e-cigarettes, saying the report piled up confusing and irrelevant information.

In a telephone interview, Fasalinos said: There is no doubt that e-cigarettes are far less harmful than smoking. rdquo; He believes that people's concerns about e-cigarettes are exaggerated. ldquo; For those who have failed to quit smoking through other methods, e-cigarettes can indeed save lives. rdquo; However, he also recommends that only those who have tried other methods but still cannot quit smoking should use e-cigarettes.# p#pagination title #e#

Scientists in many fields have found that their research is being attacked by critics. They use verbal abuse to sow the seeds of suspicion and cover up unfavorable findings.

Research that tobacco contributes to climate change has been challenged by groups backed by companies whose profits may be threatened by litigation or regulation. Similar activities are also detrimental to scientific research on pesticides and vaccines. Currently, supporters of e-cigarettes are trying to downplay doubts about the safety of e-cigarettes. Some of these supporters have received support from industry-related organizations.

On the one hand, researchers say they have found disturbing preliminary evidence from laboratory studies that e-cigarettes can pose a serious health threat.

Opponents of the studies argue that e-cigarettes create opportunities for smokers to avoid disease and death caused by tobacco. As a result, they lashed out at research that they believed was flawed, biased, or unreliable. Some researchers who support e-cigarettes have received funding from e-cigarette or tobacco companies. Podcast owners, trade groups and think tanks closely related to the industry help them amplify their voices.

Epidemiologists believe e-cigarettes have become religious divisions

Wasim Maziak, an epidemiologist at Florida International University, said that among researchers focusing on addiction, this has become a religious divide, and you either support e-cigarettes or you oppose them. ldquo; Many people have invested their careers and personal reputations in supporting e-cigarettes, thinking it is the best thing that has ever happened to us, and they will not back down." rdquo;

These rallies are obvious and organized, Payton said. No matter where you are, the same group of people will come to trouble you and try to slander your job.& rdquo;

But Bates said he used his spare time to organize the petition against Payton's research. He doesn't believe that these activities are organized as Payton claims, and that the opposition to e-cigarettes is more well-funded. He referred to a campaign funded by Bloomberg founder and majority shareholder Michael Bloomberg. Bloomberg personally invested money to promote a ban on flavored e-cigarettes and tobacco products.

“This is a completely asymmetric conflict.& rdquo; Bates said.

Data from the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention show that smoking remains the leading cause of preventable death and disease globally. Every year, approximately 480,000 Americans die from the effects of smoking. In Europe, especially Greece, smoking is high, so finding ways to quit smoking has become very interesting.

After surveying people who were and had smoked near Athens, Greece, Fasalinos found that many people gave up regular cigarettes and switched to e-cigarettes. ldquo; This shows that e-cigarettes are having a positive public health impact in one of the countries with the highest smoking rates in the EU. rdquo; Fasalinos and colleagues published the study this year in the journal Internal Medicine and Emergency Medicine.

Fasalinos said he did not receive any funding from e-cigarette companies and that his salary was paid for through government grants.

Medical journals reveal that e-cigarette supporters have received funding from e-cigarette companies

However, according to information disclosed in multiple medical journals, some of the research he conducted a few years ago was sponsored by industry associations and e-cigarette companies, including the American Electronic Liquids Manufacturing Standards Association (AEMSA), the Tennessee Smoke-Free Association, the Greek e-cigarette company Nobacco, and e-liquid manufacturer FlavourArt.

Scott Eley, president of AEMSA, said in an email that the two studies Fasalinos conducted for the association were conducted independently to answer questions from U.S. regulators, and that the association was not involved in how the studies were advanced.

Nobacco once sponsored a study at the Onassis Heart Surgery Center on the impact of e-cigarettes on blood vessel elasticity. Nobacco said the sponsorship was made in 2013 and has not sponsored any Fasalinos research since then.

The Tennessee Smoke-Free Association said its research with Fasalinos focused on how flavored e-cigarettes can help smokers switch from regular cigarettes to e-cigarettes, and the results of the research have been submitted to regulators. A spokesperson for FlavourArt said the company sponsored a study by Fasalinos in 2013, but has not collaborated since. This study shows that e-cigarette vapor does not damage cells.# p#pagination title #e#

In 2011, Fasalinos received a photo of two friends smoking e-cigarettes, and he knew nothing about e-cigarettes at the time. He believes that this is just a waste of time. At the time, he smoked a pack and a half a day and tried various methods to quit smoking, including nicotine gum and prescription drugs, but none of them were successful.

Out of curiosity, he began studying e-cigarettes at the Onassis Center. In 2012, his team conducted a short-term study to compare e-cigarettes and ordinary cigarette smokers, and found that e-cigarettes damaged heart function. After reaching this conclusion, he began smoking e-cigarettes and quickly quit ordinary cigarettes. The study was published at the European Society of Cardiology conference in Munich in August 2012.

Fasalinos 'research quickly attracted the attention of a young, fast-growing industry. The industry is eager to prove its products are safer than regular cigarettes. According to a blog post, AEMSA sponsored a study by Fasalinos on nicotine delivery in e-cigarettes and asked him to submit the results to the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA).

Fasalinos currently peddles his findings at academic conferences around the world, and sometimes in countries considering regulating e-cigarettes. In May this year, he appeared at a conference in the Philippines to promote the benefits of e-cigarettes to officials.

According to a local newspaper report, Fasalinos said: No one has the right to ignore scientific evidence. rdquo;

In June, he spoke at the Global Nicotine Forum in Warsaw. In August, he traveled to Seoul to participate in the 3rd Asian Forum on Reducing Smoking Harms. In September, at a conference in Norway, he questioned research on the link between e-cigarettes and heart disease. Later that month, he traveled to Washington to speak at a tobacco and nicotine industry event.

Fan support: Fasalinos 'work is invaluable

Fasalinos has many fans online.& ldquo; Your work is invaluable." rdquo; If someone makes a comment like this on YouTube under a video of Fasalinos 'speech, we will always be grateful for what you have done for the community. rdquo;

One of Fasalinos 'favorite claims is that scientists unfamiliar with e-cigarettes tested the products under conditions that did not match the actual situation.

For example, for a Portland State University study, Fasalinos believes that researchers overheated e-cigarette equipment and found toxic substances in it. But in practice, the concentration of these substances will not be so high. He likened the practice to baking bread and said that if it was done, there would also be carcinogens in the bread. But in fact, people who eat bread only eat dry bread. In May 2015, Fasalinos and two colleagues published a corresponding study in another journal that showed that e-cigarettes had much lower formaldehyde levels.

However, other research teams, including those at Harvard University, Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, and the Nino Desert Research Institute in Nevada, have reported that large amounts of formaldehyde have been found in some e-cigarette vapors, including at typical voltage settings. Fasalinos later published the study again, questioning some of the conclusions.

I think this is an artificial debate, said Joseph Allen, senior author of the Harvard study and a public health researcher. rdquo; He believes the strategy is similar to industry stakeholders trying to sow skepticism about climate change.

Fasalinos 'work has had a huge impact, especially in Europe. In a 2018 assessment, the British Public Health Department repeatedly cited Fasalinos 'research and concluded that there was no possible risk of formaldehyde. Other independent studies have also found that formaldehyde levels in some e-cigarettes are low.

Scientists attacked by Fasalinos criticized his research methods. Andrey Khlystov, an atmospheric chemist and co-author of the Desert Research Institute report, said Fasalinos 'work was full of self-contradictions and crazy leaps in logic.

But Fasalinos said he couldn't understand why people were so worried about e-cigarettes.

“This is a paradox. The more research we do, the more we believe that e-cigarettes are less harmful than ordinary cigarettes. rdquo; He said, however, the public's impression of e-cigarettes is getting worse every year. rdquo;

In December 2016, the U.S. Health Commissioner warned that using e-cigarettes among teenagers would pose major public health problems.“” Fasalinos then reacted again. On his blog, he dismissed the report as a seriously misleading and emotional statement with no substance.#“”“” p #pagination title #e #

Fasalinos, Riccardo Polosa, an Italian doctor who received funding from tobacco giant Philip Morris, and two other researchers later published detailed comments on the report in the Journal of Harm Reduction, saying that e-cigarette use among young people is uncommon and experimental.

The US government figures, however, tell a very different story. Since the Surgeon General's report was released, the number of high school students using e-cigarettes has more than doubled. According to the CDC, 3.69 million middle and high school students used e-cigarettes last year.

Fasalinos said that his view has not changed and that most young people who use e-cigarettes have a history of smoking.

This article was reproduced at the Electronic Cigarette Intelligence Bureau: www.hnbzzp.com/uploads/https://www.hnbzzp.com/uploads/images/20213230/