Can e-cigarettes help quit smoking? Expert: The harm of electronic cigarettes is no different from traditional tobacco, the design is lightweight and the amount of smoke can be selected
Today is "World No Tobacco Day". Smoking is a major risk factor for cardiovascular and cerebrovascular diseases and a potential culprit of chronic non-communicable diseases. Smoking and the second-hand smoke it produces pose a huge threat to human health. On the 30th, under the guidance of the Shanghai Municipal Health Commission, the Shanghai Patriotic Health Campaign Committee Office, the Shanghai Health Promotion Center and the Shanghai Smoking Control Association held a special event at the Shanghai Health Lecture Hall "Protecting Youth from Tobacco Harm". : E-cigarettes have become rapidly popular in recent years, attracting many young people to buy them. However, the harm of e-cigarettes is no different from traditional tobacco.
Li Weihao, deputy chief physician of the Department of Respiratory and Critical Care Medicine, Shanghai Jing'an District Central Hospital/Jing'an Branch of Huashan Hospital Affiliated to Fudan University, said that tobacco smoke contains more than 7,000 chemical components, including hundreds of harmful substances such as nicotine, tar, and carbon monoxide. There are 69 confirmed carcinogens. When smoking, these harmful substances will enter the human respiratory system along with the smoke, causing emphysema, chronic obstructive pulmonary disease, asthma, and even lung cancer. Not only that, the harmful substances in tobacco can damage the cardiovascular system, lead to coronary heart disease, hypertension, atherosclerosis, and then cause angina pectoris, myocardial infarction, intermittent claudication and other diseases.
In recent years, e-cigarettes with labels such as "helpful in quitting smoking" and "significantly less harmful than traditional tobacco" have rapidly become popular, attracting many young people to buy them. Li Weihao said that some e-cigarettes have exquisite and unique designs, a variety of smoke volumes, and more than 16,000 flavors to choose from. Such good-looking, fun and good-smelling e-cigarettes will arouse great curiosity among teenagers. Survey data shows that most teenagers start smoking with e-cigarettes.
However, e-cigarettes are not benign. Chen De, deputy director of the Shanghai Health Promotion Center and vice president of the Shanghai Smoking Control Association, said that e-cigarettes are electronic devices that heat a solution containing propylene glycol, glycerin, and nicotine to evaporate into aerosol for users to inhale. Secondhand smoke produced by e-cigarettes usually contains harmful health substances such as ethylene glycol, aldehydes, volatile organic compounds, and polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons.
Like traditional tobacco, long-term use of e-cigarettes increases the risk of chronic obstructive pulmonary disease, lung cancer and cardiovascular disease. The nicotine in e-cigarettes is also highly addictive. "What's even more frightening is that the aerosol particles produced by e-cigarettes are smaller than traditional tobacco and are easier to penetrate into the lungs." Li Weihao reminded.
Today, e-cigarettes are no longer an outlaw. The "Regulations on the Implementation of the Tobacco Monopoly Law" revised by the State Council in November 2021 will implement e-cigarettes with reference to the relevant management regulations on cigarettes. The "E-cigarette Management Measures" and "E-Cigarette" mandatory national standards have also been released successively. In November 2022, the "Shanghai Regulations on Smoking Control in Public Places" was revised to include e-cigarettes in the scope of bans on smoking in public places.
Experts also mentioned that in the process of quitting smoking, you often encounter many "stumbling blocks" that shake your belief in quitting, the most common of which are withdrawal symptoms. Withdrawal symptoms are a normal reaction during the process of quitting smoking. They are usually most obvious within 14 days of quitting smoking and gradually reduce after about one month. Generally, they will not cause adverse effects on the body. Chen De emphasized, "Some people's illnesses after quitting smoking are often the consequences of years of smoking and have nothing to do with quitting smoking. We should not attribute the symptoms after quitting smoking to quitting smoking."
Survivor bias is the other two "stumbling blocks" in quitting smoking. "'The old man next door has been smoking all his life, and now he is still active and active in his 90s. There is nothing wrong with him.' This kind of survivor bias is what the survivors left around him give us. Due to the cognitive bias caused by people, diseases and even deaths caused by smoking are often ignored. However, studies have proven that the average life span of smokers is 10 years shorter than that of non-smokers, and the "longevity smokers" are just an illusion. ” said the expert.
At present, Shanghai has a comprehensive city-wide smoking cessation service network. The city has built 37 standardized smoking cessation clinics to evaluate and formulate personalized smoking cessation plans for smokers. You can check it on the "Smoke-free Shanghai" WeChat official account and the "Healthy Cloud Pro" applet. Information on smoking cessation clinics across the city. Citizens who need to quit smoking can obtain smoking cessation support and services through the following channels and methods: dial 12320 smoking cessation hotline; join the health self-management group in your community; follow the WeChat public of "Smoke-free Shanghai" and "Shanghai Xiaokang-Shanghai Health Science Popularization Resource Library" Number. In the next step, Shanghai will interconnect the above smoking cessation service resources through information technology to realize "Internet smoking cessation" and big data precise smoking cessation services.
The event was hosted by the Jing'an District Health Committee and the Jing'an District Center for Disease Control and Prevention.
