Vaping with e-cigarettes, or the process of inhaling vaporized liquid that may or may not contain nicotine, has become popular among those who are trying to quit smoking and those who otherwise enjoy it as a hobby.
A vape usually contains four or five parts: a main console called a tube, a chargeable battery, a cartridge and atomizer that hold and vaporize the liquid, and the tip through which the vapor is inhaled. These multiple parts, along with the liquid inside, called e-juice or e-liquid, allow for customization in the vaping experience.
The function of these vapes is to heat up the liquid, which creates a vapor to be inhaled. This simulates the sensation of smoking a cigarette. E-cigarettes, however, are unlike cigarettes in that they are usually flavored due to the e-liquid inside them. This liquid can either contain no nicotine, or can have upwards of 24 mg of nicotine in each bottle. Most vapes must use a diluent to ensure safe nicotine levels.
Vaping as a hobby
An anonymous senior says, “I’ve vaped for a while now, [for] about a year or so. It’s not a hobby in a typical sense, but you do get wrapped up in customizing your mod and upgrading your stuff. It’s something to do, and I’ve come to enjoy it.”
“I use to just buy juice that was flavored, and that worked for me at that time. But then I decided to try out some with nicotine and I liked the head buzz you got with that so I stuck with it. I was never addicted to [cigarettes], but I have friends who were, and vapes definitely helped their transition into less nicotine,” he adds.
However, some avoid nicotine altogether. Another senior adds, “I bought a vape a few months ago. It’s really cool to have different flavors and to use it when you’re out with your friends or driving. It’s more of just a fun thing for me. I don’t ever put any juice with nicotine in my vape. I don’t see the purpose of it, and there’s a ton of downsides with what that does to your body. I’ve been offered cigarettes and vapes with nicotine in them at parties but I try to stay away from that. It’s just not worth it.”
A former Aragon student agrees, emphasizing that the social aspect of vaping is what makes it appealing. “I started vaping last year when I was a senior,” he says. “It kind of just became a habit. The nicotine was nice, but it was more of the social aspect. My whole friend group started doing it, and it only grew once I got to college. I’ve kept up with it mainly for that reason.”
An anonymous Aragon senior who both vapes and smokes compares the two, saying, “I’ve been vaping for a bit now. It’s really calming and the nicotine head rush you get is great. Vaping is more of a social habit, although I smoke [cigarettes] with some other people too. The head rush with a vape [compared to one from smoking a real cigarette] isn’t as satisfying. The whole experience just doesn’t compare to a real cigarette, but I understand why people use it. It’s a whole lot easier, and you don’t really have to deal with a lot of the excess of smoking, like the butts, the smoke, and everything that goes along with it.”
This student continues, “I know that smoking either [e-cigs or real ones] is bad for me, but there are worse things to do, and honestly a lot of what kids do in their spare time isn’t healthy. I don’t see myself quitting cigarettes soon, but if I did, a vape would be a nice transition to help deal with smaller amounts of nicotine.”
Do they help you quit?
Vapes are commonly touted as effective in smoking cessation, a better alternative to cigarettes that contain upwards of 4,000 different chemicals.
However, smoking cessation champion, vascular surgeon and Aragon parent Greg Lukaszewicz doesn’t know for sure if that’s the case. “My organization, Kaiser, doesn’t take a stance on e-cigarettes,” he says. “We say, we don’t know what these are, [so] we don’t recommend these for smoking cessation. People say they use it to help them quit, but there’s no data that actually supports that. There are people who say, oh I’ve quit smoking because I used e-cigs for a while, and my patients have done that, so it’s possible, but [if we look] at a large group of people we don’t know if that’s actually the case or not.”
The lack of medical literature means that the potentially negative — or even positive — effects of e-cigarettes are largely unknown. The mystery surrounding vaping, says Lukaszewicz, is what makes it so dangerous. “It’s hard to make a recommendation based on the lack of studies, but it’s kind of a precautionary principle to prove it’s safe rather than just assume it is before using it. A good reason not to get involved in vaping is that we just don’t know what dangers it holds years down the road,” he says.
While the effects of e-cigs as a whole may be largely unknown, the effects of nicotine are not. “It affects your heart, it increases your blood pressure, there’s some thought that it stimulates angiogenesis, the stimulation of your blood vessels, which can have a negative effect in terms of stimulating tumor growth,” says Lukaszewicz. “There’s actually a thought that nicotine itself promotes atherosclerosis, the hardening of the arteries. Nicotine itself just has some detrimental effects, and it’s just highly addictive.”
Lukaszewicz concedes, “It’s still the lesser of two evils, but it’s not that much the lesser of two evils. We know how bad cigarettes are, but just because we don’t know if something is as bad isn’t an excuse to do it. There are very little benefits. Nicotine is a drug; it’s a very powerful, addictive drug. The delivery system has dangers we don’t know about. Ultimately, we really don’t know what it can do, and it’s so addictive that if you can avoid becoming addicted to that substance [nicotine], I think it’s best to avoid doing it altogether.”
