​Study Proves Long-Term Vaping Does Not Negatively Affect Health

If you hadn’t heard, a long-term study has proven that vapers do not suffer from any lung health issues or changes in lung health cause by vaping. There is no evidence that anyone with a lung-related health condition would be any worse-off if they decided to vape. The opposite is known to be true for those who start or continue to smoke tobacco cigarettes.

Public Health England are happy to advocate for the use of e cigarettes as a way to help people quit smoking and as a healthier alternative. Indeed, not only do they agree with the evidence to date that support the idea of vaping being healthier, they produced their own health review recently stating that they find vaping to be at least 95% less harmful than tobacco cigarettes.

First of all, for Public Health England to be weighing in and advocating for the use of e cigarettes is significant. It was Public Health England (PHE) who put together and implemented the Go Smoke Free legislation of 2007 which effectively saw a wide-scale ban on public smoking. These bans are still in place and restrict smoking in the workplace, in cafes, restaurants and pubs, on public transport, indoors and more. PHE even included vaping as a valid cessation device when designing their 2017 Stoptober campaign materials which were accessed by those looking to give up smoking as part of the annual stop smoking month event.

Many believe that the reason PHE and others can’t state that vaping is 100% healthier than tobacco smoking is because it hasn’t be around long enough to produce a long term study into lung and health changes. There have been long term studies (not long enough for some it would seem) yet ones which offer a significant amount of evidence to put towards those reviewing vaping’s impact on health for various reasons, be it for verification, for any other reason.

A Longer Term Vaping Health Study

Just six months ago (Nov 2017) a three and a half year study into the effects of using vaping devices and e cigarettes was concluded and reported on in the Scientific Reports. In the first study of its kind, the research team studied and assessed a group of e cigarette users (those using e cigarettes daily and whom had never smoke tobacco cigarettes) and a group of non-smoking and non-vaping participants. The study threw up a lot of data but the punchline was that over a long period of time, there were no changes in the lung health of the non-smoking, never smoking vapers and those who had neither smoked or vaped. This effectively debunks any and all myths about how vaping causes lung damage in the same way that tobacco smoking does and many other unfounded untruths and rumours.

Interestingly the report also found no difference in heart rates or blood pressure levels which further disproves the concerns some have about the health effects of nicotine.

Where We Are Now

Three and a half years and no detectable changes for those vaping is a pretty good indicator of how vaping is not only healthier in the short term but also longer term. Of course, with these studies being relatively new, in the same way that vaping is, some would be happier if a study over a longer period of time shows the same results. As this isn’t something that has been reported on just yet it is a case of time will tell. That said, these results are very encouraging and back up everything that Public Health England and various other health professionals, organisations and charities have said about the validity of vaping as a significantly healthier alternative to tobacco cigarette smoking.