News Digest

Formaldehyde in e-cigarettes may boost cancer risk

When heated to the max and inhaled deeply, e-cigarettes produce the toxic chemical formaldehyde, which could make the devices up to 15 times more cancerous than regular cigarettes, U.S. researchers said Wednesday. E-cigarettes are battery powered devices that heat up a liquid containing nicotine and artificial flavoring. The vapor is inhaled, much like a cigarette. While some say e-cigarettes may help tobacco smokers kick the habit, others are concerned that the unregulated devices are being marketed widely despite little long-term evidence about their health effects.

Formaldehyde-releasing agents may deposit more efficiently in the respiratory tract than gaseous formaldehyde, and so they could carry a higher slope factor for cancer.

A Portland State University report

The team from Portland State University experimented with a machine that “inhaled” e-cigarette vapor at low voltage and high voltage to see if and how much formaldehyde was produced by the heating of the vaping liquid, which contains flavoring chemicals, nicotine, propylene glycol and glycerol. The machine took 10 puffs over the course of five minutes, each puff lasting three to four seconds. when it inhaled at the highest setting, five volts, formaldehyde was detected, at levels far higher than seen in conventional tobacco cigarettes. The daily estimate of formaldehyde exposure for a pack-a-day smoker is three milligrams. That level of exposure could boost the risk of cancer five to 15 times higher than in long-term smokers, it added, using two previous studies on formaldehyde in cigarettes as reference.

In e-cigarette use by humans, overheating the liquid generates acrid tasting ‘dry puff’ which is unpleasant and avoided rather than slowly inhaled. When a chicken is burned, the resulting black crisp will contain carcinogens but that does not mean that chicken are carcinogenic.

Peter Hajek, director of the Tobacco Dependence Research Unit at Barts and The London School of Medicine and Dentistry, who said the study did not reflect real-world conditions.