Tag: e-cigarettes

CPSC Sends Warning on Repackaged 18650 Batteries
The U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission (CPSC) has warned that consumers should not buy or use 18650 lithium-ion battery cells — used in some vaping products, flashlights and toys — due to a possible fire and even death risk.
Credit: Lithium Battery China
The Commission said it is working with e-commerce sites like ‘eBay’ to remove listings of loose or repackaged “18650 lithium-ion” batteries, according to a press release. A superior court in California recently denied a request by Samsung to dismiss a lawsuit about an exploding e-cigarette lithium-ion batteries.
The market does have single 18650 batteries that are intended for use in consumer products. The CPSC warning is about batteries separated from cells that use multiple 18650s such as battery packs for electric automobiles.
“These cells are manufactured as industrial component parts of battery packs and are not intended for individual sale to consumers. However, they are being separated, rewrapped and sold as new consumer batteries, typically on the Internet,” the CPSC said in a statement on Saturday. “Specifically these battery cells may have exposed metal positive and negative terminals that can short-circuit when they come into contact with metal objects such as keys or loose change in a pocket.”
Once shorted, loose cells could overheat and experience thermal runaway, igniting the cell’s internal materials and forcibly expelling burning contents, resulting in fires, explosions, serious injuries and even death.
“Unfortunately a growing number of small consumer products such as vaping devices, personal fans, headlamps and some toys are using loose 18650s as a power source,” the CPSC stated in the release.
January 11, 2021
Study Claims Non-Nicotine Vaping Disrupts Gut
A recent study claims that the chemicals found in vapor products without nicotine disrupt the gut barrier and trigger inflammation in the body, potentially leading to a variety of seperate health concerns.
Credit: Priscilla du Preez

In the study, published in the journal iScience, lead authors Soumita Das, associate professor of pathology, and Pradipta Ghosh, professor of cellular and molecular medicine at University of California San Diego (UCSD) School of Medicine and Moores Cancer Center at UCSD School of Medicine, found that chronic use of nicotine-free e-cigarettes led to a “leaky gut,” in which microbes and other molecules seep out of the intestines, resulting in chronic inflammation.
Such inflammation can contribute to a variety of diseases and conditions, including inflammatory bowel disease, dementia, certain cancers, atherosclerosis, liver fibrosis, diabetes, and arthritis, according to a press release.
“The gut lining is an amazing entity. It is comprised of a single layer of cells that are meant to seal the body from the trillions of microbes, defend our immune system, and at the same time allow absorption of essential nutrients,” said Ghosh. “Anything we eat or drink, our lifestyle choices in other words, has the ability to impact our gut microbes, the gut barrier and overall health. Now we know that what we smoke, such as e-cigarettes, negatively impacts it as well.”
The researchers say that two chemicals used as a base for all most e-liquids — propylene glycol and vegetable glycerin — were the cause of inflammation. Both chemicals are used in many food products that the U.S. Food and Drug Administration has stated are safe for human consumption.
“Numerous chemicals are created when these two are heated to generate the fumes in vaping that cause the most damage, for which there are no current regulations,” said Ghosh. “The safety of e-cigarettes have been debated fiercely on both sides. Nicotine content, and its addictive nature, has always been the major focus of those who argue against its safety, whereas lack of chemicals in the carcinogens that are present in the cigarette smoke has been touted by the makers of e-cigarettes when marketing these products as a ‘healthy alternative.’ In reality, it’s the chemicals making up the vapor-liquid that we should be more concerned about as they are the cause of gut inflammation.”
January 11, 2021
Judge Dismisses Investor Lawsuit Against Juul Labs

Photo: Okan Caliskan from Pixabay
A federal judge in Fort Lauderdale, Florida, USA, has dismissed investors’ lawsuit against tobacco distributor Greenlane Holdings, reports Reuters.
Investors filed a class action lawsuit, claiming Greenlane should have mentioned a pending ban on e-cigarettes before publicly offering stock in 2019.
U.S. District Judge Roy Altman dismissed the proposed class action, saying the distributor for Juul Labs had no duty to flag San Francisco’s then-pending ban on e-cigarettes to investors ahead of its initial public offering in 2019, according to Reuters. Altman called the class action “nothing more than a hammer in search of a nail.”
Altman ruled that the investors did not have a viable claim under the Securities Act of 1933 because Greenlane warned them of the risk of increased tobacco regulation in its registration statement, and the proposed e-cigarette ban was already public.
January 11, 2021
London Leads Vype Survey of Top UK Vape Cities
UK adults spent close to £7 million on vape products between January and October of 2020, with nearly 3 million adults now vaping. These are just some of the findings of a recently released study by the Vype e-cigarette brand. Vype launched the study to discover which UK cities had embraced vaping the most.
The British American Tobacco-owned brand took a comprehensive look into the vape industry both on and offline, delving into which of the UK’s cities were the biggest buyers of their products, and where is home to the most physical vape shops in the UK.
Vype conducted a survey of 2,000 of the UK’s over 18 population, to explore the nation’s vaping perceptions and who is most open about their habit, according to an article in Retail Times..
London leads cities by sales
It’s no surprise that London leads the charge when it comes to top cities by sales, spending more than double that of Birmingham residents in the same time frame. In fact, purchases made by Londoners make up 40% of Vype’s total UK sales to date in 2020, and 83% of the sales from the top 10 biggest spending cities.
Looking at the offline culture, it may be surprising to learn that Leeds is home to the most bricks-and-mortar vape shops per square mile. The northern city has 18 vape shops per square mile, while London only just features in the top five with only 13 shops per square mile. Rounding out the top five are Edinburgh with 17 shops per sqm, York with 15 shops per sqm, and Sheffield with 14 shops per sqm.
When it comes to the products adults have been buying, the top selling flavours across the UK were consistent across England, Scotland, and Wales. Crisp Mint is currently leading as the best-selling Vype flavour, followed by Blended Tobacco and Dark Cherry. The only region this differs in, is Northern Ireland, where Crushed Mint is their best-selling Vype flavour. With the UK’s Menthol Ban implemented back in May, it isn’t surprising that varieties of mint are the favourites for online buyers this year.
Insight into attitudes around the UK
Around the UK, Vype uncovered a range of cities with positive sentiments towards the vapers of the population. It was discovered that adults in Brighton are the least affected by others vaping around them, with 43% of respondents answering that it doesn’t bother them when this happens.
While in Belfast, Vype found that people would be more likely to allow another person to vape in their home or car, with 23% saying they would – this is more than any other city! Belfast is also home to the largest group of adults who vape as an alternative to smoking (21%), followed by adults in Glasgow (also 21%).
To uncover the cities with residents who feel like their habit is most accepted, Vype also questioned the nation about their feelings of being judged. Almost half of Glaswegians (48%) say they don’t feel judged by others for vaping in public, and they are followed closely by adults in Nottingham (44%) and Liverpool (42%).
Liverpool is also home to adults who have vaped the longest – almost two thirds (58%) of respondents say they have vaped for three years or more. Adults in Liverpool are also the most likely to vape at their place of work, with 33% admitting to doing so.
Nearby in Manchester, over a third of respondents (39%) from the city do already or would consider vaping in the future – that’s more than any other city. With only three vape shops per square mile, it’s no wonder Manchester makes the top ten list for online sales.
Vocal about vaping
Two in five (40%) of the UK’s adult vapers are open about vaping, saying that everyone that knows them knows that they do. Females are more likely to be open about this fact, with 42% saying that everyone knows they vape, compared to only 39% of men saying the same. Of those truly vocal about vaping, the over-55s are the most open, with 78% saying everyone knows that they vape. Only 51% of 45-54-year-olds say the same thing – the next closest age group.
Looking at the cities which are most open about vaping, adults living in Norwich top the list, with 63% saying everyone knows they vape. They are closely followed by Southampton, with 62% of adults in the southern city saying the same thing. Residents in Bristol follow this with 56%, Liverpool close behind on 50% and rounding out the top five is Glasgow with 48% of vapers being open about their pastime.
Vaping gaining acceptance
Just under a third (31%) of survey respondents said it doesn’t bother them if someone vapes near them. In fact, 10% of respondents across the nation who don’t vape said they would still allow someone else to vape inside their home and car. Females are the least likely to be bothered by someone vaping near them – but only just. With 32% of women saying they didn’t mind people vaping around them, there was only 1% in it with 31% of men saying the same.
Looking into the differences between adult age groups, 45-54-year olds are the least bothered by someone vaping near them, with 35% of them saying it doesn’t matter to them. This group is followed by the over 55s at 33%, and the 18-24-year-olds at 31%.
Of all UK adults who would consider vaping as an alternative to smoking, it was the Bristolians who lead the charge, with 6% saying they would consider the option in the future. The same percentage of UK adults who live in Nottingham, don’t currently vape but are most intrigued by the variety of flavours.
Going smoke-free
The residents of Plymouth have taken up vaping the most lately, with the biggest number of new vapers – fifty percent of respondents from Plymouth have been vaping for less than one year. Plymouth is also home to the greatest number of vapers who only vape once a week too; three quarters (75%) of respondents from Plymouth said they only vape once a week. The next largest group vaping just once a week are living in Sheffield, where. almost a quarter (23%) of residents of this northern city vape once-a-week too.
Cardiff has the most residents that have been vaping for between one and two years (72% have) – way more than any other city. However, they are also the city which spends the least online but buy the most products in each purchase – almost 3 times as many with every online sale this year, compared to other cities. . However, as well as spending the least online, they also only have 1.4 physical vape stores per square mile to rely on too!
On the back of the research, Aftab Saleem, head of e-commerce, UK&I at Vype said: “it’s great to see that the biggest reason adult nicotine consumers are turning to vape products is that they are looking for a smoke-free alternative, followed by the fact they enjoy the taste. That certainly is represented in the UK’s top flavours, with classic flavours coming out on top across the board. We are glad to be giving consumers an alternative to physical shopping too to allow them to continue to choose an alternative nicotine product. Now more than ever we need to help consumers achieve their shopping goals in other ways, whilst some non-essential stores are closed for business”
January 10, 2021
Group Says Feds Making it Harder to Quit Smoking
In late December of last year, the Government of Canada announced a proposal to lower the allowable levels of nicotine in vaping products from 66 milligrams per millilitre to 20 mg/ml in an effort to curb youth vaping. The public consultation period would be in effect for 75 days, closing on Mar. 4, 2021.
Credit: Toptop54
The proposed reduction is a move vaping advocates say will minimize their value to adult smokers looking to transition away from cigarettes, according to the Morinville News.
However, the Canada-based Vaping Industry Trade Association (VITA) says smokers having access to sufficient nicotine levels in an alternate product is essential to the effectiveness of vaping as a harm reduction product. “A limit of 20mg/mL is simply too low for many smokers,” Allan Rewak executive director of VITA stated in a media release. “Adult smokers need access to higher nicotine vapor products at the beginning of their journey from smoking to vaping. Lowering this limit is just going to keep more smokers smoking.”
The Canadian government is following a move by Nova Scotia, who in April of this year, instituted a 20mg/mL nicotine cap as well as a flavor ban. VITA says that change in the rules saw a 25 percent increase in legal cigarette sales increase, an increase four times higher than surrounding provinces. The regulations also resulted in half of the province’s specialty vape shops closing their doors.
“Considering the disparity of harm between vaping and smoking, we don’t understand why the federal government would be using Health Canada resources during a global pandemic to explore making it harder for adult smokers to switch to a reduced risk product,” said VITA president Daniel David.
Enforcement the real problem
The Government of Canada has previously put some measures in place to address youth vaping. Those changes include public education campaigns and banning the advertising of vaping products in public spaces if the ads can be seen or heard by youth.
Thomas Kirsop, owner of Alternatives & Options, a vape store in Morinville and St. Albert said he believes the government is taking the wrong approach with the nicotine reduction to handle the rise in youth vaping.
“A 60 percent reduction in commercially available nicotine concentration will impede my ability to assist the heaviest smokers,” Kirsop said. “It is a federal offence to knowingly sell vapor products to minors or for members of the adult population to provide these products to underaged consumers. In practice, however, I find this law poorly enforced. I think enforcing the current law would yield more significant gains than destroying the efficacy of a less harmful solution.”
Health Canada says restricting flavors in vaping products, and requiring the vaping industry to provide information about their vaping products, including sales, ingredients, and research and development activities are under consideration.
January 7, 2021
Montana City Wants to Extend Flavored Vape Ban to County
In late November, the City of Missoula, Montana banned flavored vaping products and not flavored combustible tobacco products. Now, Missoula County is considering using its extraterritorial powers to extend the city’s ban on the sale of flavored vapes and their display five miles outside city limits next week.
If approved, it would be the first time Missoula County applied its extraterritorial powers in four years. The last time it did was related to the city’s smoking ordinance.
“This initially started with the health board adopting a resolution and asking both the commission and City Council to do something to stop the epidemic of youth tobacco, especially using vape products,” said Shannon Therriault, county director of environmental health. “We were seeing a giant increase in the number of kids becoming addicted to nicotine, and a lot of that traces back to flavored tobacco products.”
The city ordinance goes into effect this month.
The city ordinance bans the display of self-service tobacco products of any kind, except where children aren’t permitted. It also banned the sale of all flavored electronic tobacco products, and made it illegal to sell tobacco to anyone under the age of 18.
“The health board reviewed it and approved. Now, it’s coming to the commissioners to review and approve,” said Therriault, according to the Missoula Current. “If approved, it can be applied five miles outside the city limits. It’s great, because it takes in a large amount of the area – the urban area.”
The original city ordinance included a ban on all flavored tobacco, which had the support of health officials but was opposed by dozens of businesses and tobacco users.
January 6, 2021
Two California Cities Start Nation’s Strictest Vaping Bans
Two California cities have become the only jurisdictions in the U.S. to eliminate the sale of all vaping and traditional tobacco products. On January 1st, Beverly Hills and Manhattan Beach, both in the Los Angeles area, began to enforce the strictest vaping rules in the country. The law also included a phase-out period for retailers to empty their shelves of e-cigarettes. Other cities are considering enacting similar bans.
The Beverly Hills City Council, the first to pass its ordinance, proposed the rule nearly three years ago during a meeting discussing the potential ban of flavored vaping products. Ultimately, the council settled on a total ban of all vaping and traditional tobacco products.
Credit: Haiberliu
“Somebody’s got to be first, so let it be us,” said then-Mayor, current Councilmember John Mirisch, who first proposed the concept in 2017, according to a press release. Mirisch recently joined the Board of Trustees of the advocacy group Action on Smoking & Health (ASH), which coordinates Project Sunset, an effort to phase out tobacco sales worldwide.
“Cigarettes have become so normalized that to some this might seem like a drastic step,” said Chris Bostic, ASH Policy Director. “But if another product emerged tomorrow that was highly addictive and killed when used as intended, of course we’d ban its sale. We’d probably charge the people who marketed it with manslaughter too.”
Total vaping and tobacco bans have been gaining traction more recently, within the public health community and more broadly. The Danish Institute for Human Rights, after concluding a human rights assessment of Philip Morris International in 2017, concluded that “there can be no doubt that the production and marketing of tobacco is irreconcilable with the human right to health. For the tobacco industry, the UNGPs [United Nations Guiding Principles on Business and Human Rights] therefore require the cessation of the production and marketing of tobacco.”
Vapor industry advocates say that banning e-cigarettes only pushes former combustible cigarettes smokers back to combustibles. They also say that vaping bans increase the size of the black market. Black market THC vaping products were the cause of a lung disease that sickened and killed numerous youth in 2019.
January 5, 2021
RELX Files With SEC For $100 Million U.S. Stock Sale
RLX Technology, parent to the RELX brand of vaping products, has filed with the Security Exchange Commission (SEC) in the U.S. to raise up to $100 million in an initial public offering (IPO).
Credit: RELX Technology
The $100 million request is well below the $1 billion the company said it expected to raise when it announced Citigroup as the bank of record for its planned initial public offering in the U.S., people with knowledge of the matter said.
The Shenzhen-based company, which counts Sequoia Capital among its backers, boasts a 62.6 percent market share in China for closed-system vaping products in terms of retail sales, according to a press release.
“The company has partnered with 110 authorized distributors to supply its products to over 5,000 RELX Branded Partner Stores, and over 100,000 other retail outlets nationwide, covering over 250 cities in China,” the release states.
Revenue for the company nearly doubled in the nine months ended September 30, 2020 to $324 million, with net income of $16 million.
The Beijing, China-based company was founded in 2018 and booked $400 million in sales for the 12 months ended September 30, 2020. It plans to list on the NYSE under the symbol RLX. RLX Technology filed confidentially on October 26, 2020. Citi is the sole bookrunner on the deal. No pricing terms were disclosed.
January 5, 2021
Studies Say Vaping ‘May’ Help Smokers Quit Combustibles
Vaping studies often contain a lot of modal verbs like can, could, may and might. For example, an updated study on e-cigarettes for smoking cessation by the Cochrane Review suggest that vaping “could” help smokers quit using deadly combustible cigarettes.
The Cochrane study looked at 50 studies that took place in the US, the UK, Italy, Australia, New Zealand, Greece, Belgium, Canada, Poland, South Korea, South Africa, Switzerland and Turkey. The review found that e-cigarettes “could” be the answer many smokers are looking for according to an article in The New Strait Times.
Among the key findings were that smokers were likely to stop smoking for at least six months by switching to a vaping device with a nicotine e-liquid as compared to nicotine replacement therapy (such as gum and patches), nicotine-free vaporizers or behavioural support.
The researchers, made up of multiple independent and internationally-renowned healthcare experts, found that vaping with a nicotine e-liquid can help 10 in 100 people to stop smoking, compared to only 6 in 100 people who have tried using nicotine-replacement therapy or vaping nicotine-free e-liquids. Only an estimated 4 in 100 who try to quit without support, or those who rely only on behavioural support, are likely to succeed.
They also did not detect any clear evidence of serious harm from vaping a nicotine e-liquid.
Jamie Hartmann-Boyce from the Cochrane Tobacco Addiction Group said there is an increase in evidence of smoking cessation through the use of e-cigarettes compared to the last review in 2016.
“The randomised evidence on smoking cessation has increased since the last version of the review and there is now evidence that electronic cigarettes with nicotine are likely to increase the chances of quitting successfully compared to nicotine gum or patches,” said Hartmann-Boyce, the lead author of the review. “While there is currently no clear evidence of any serious side effects, there is considerable uncertainty about the harms of electronic cigarettes and longer-term data are needed. Scientific consensus holds that electronic cigarettes are considerably less harmful than traditional cigarettes, but not risk-free.”
In contrast, a recent study from the University of California San Francisco (UCSF), led by Richard Wang, determined that that e-cigarettes do not lead smokers away from addiction. Wang also claims that e-cigarettes “could” increase a users risk of disease. “If the use of consumer device products is not associated with increased smoking cessation, there is no health benefit,” he said. “Also, as people who smoke add e-cigarettes to their smoking, their risk of disease could increase.”
Wang worked with fellow UCSF researcher Sudhamiyi Bhadriraju and disgraced former UCSF researcher Stanton Glantz, who has recently had multiple studies retracted for what has been labeled by fellow scientists as “explicit dishonesty.”
This latest study was based on the collection of 64 trials in which participants were examined. All of them are e-cigarette users, according to an article on Explica.com.
“In observational studies you are asking people about the use of the devices they bought themselves. But they did it without specific guidance to quit smoking,” says Wang. “In a randomized trial, you test a product, treating it as a therapy or drug to quit.”
Wang then goes on to say there “may” be a cessation effect. “When certain electronic devices are treated as medicines, there may actually be a smoking cessation effect,” explains Wang. “But it has to be balanced against the risks of using cigarettes.”
January 4, 2021
Study Claims Vaping Could Cloud Thinking

Photo: Kevinsphotos from Pixabay
Vaping can have a negative effect on memory, thinking skills and the ability to focus, particularly for young people, according to a recent study by researchers at the University of Rochester (New York) Medical Center.
“Our studies add to growing evidence that vaping should not be considered a safe alternative to tobacco smoking,” said Head researcher Dongmei Li.
The study is based on data analyzed from the over 886,000 participants involved in the Behavioral Risk Factor Surveillance System Survey and the more than 18,000 responses from the National Youth Tobacco Survey.
The researchers concluded that those who vaped or smoked cigarettes were more likely to struggle with cognitive function than those who had never smoked in any capacity. Also, the researchers noted that age played a large role in the participants’ cognitive abilities as they found that when participants were younger than 14 when they started vaping or smoking, they were even more likely to have cognitive struggles as adults.
“With the recent rise in teen vaping, this is very concerning and suggests that we need to intervene even earlier. Prevention programs that start in middle or high school might actually be too late,” Li added.
January 2, 2021