Health risks of e-cigarettes emerge

摘要

Electronic cigarettes, marketed as safer than regular cigarettes, deliver a cocktail of toxic chemicals, including carcinogens, into the lungs, new studies show. Using e-cigarettes may even promote antibiotic-resistant bacterial infections. Engineers developed e-cigarettes several years ago to provide tobacco users a smoke-free source of nicotine. The devices heat up a liquid that a user inhales, or "vapes." Because e-cigarettes burn nothing, they release no smoke. "There's no question that a puff on an e-cigarette is less toxic than a puff on a regular cigarette," says Stanton Glantz, director of the Center for Tobacco Control Research and Education at the University of California, San Francisco. But few studies have looked at the vapors' toxicity. So scientists have been circumspect about describing e-cigarettes as safe.