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Are we taking Diacetyl seriously enough?

tachikoma

Postman
Joined
Sep 9, 2015
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Yes I know, another Diacetyl thread...

So last night I was bored and scaring myself reading up on Diacetyl, lawsuits, symptoms, lung replacements, etc and this morning coincidentally I have seen a few articles about the safety of it and how it's found in "around 75% of liquids" (which I figure is Daily Mail levels of accuracy)

Seeing as I pretty much only vape cream/custard liquids, I am probably consuming quite a lot of this stuff, so was wondering if anyone else has had any concerns about it but use it anyway, seeing as most of us are probably planning to vape long-term and so many of us like our creamy/custardy liquids.

My next batch of DIY liquid will be using Capella Vanilla Custard V2, which is apparently diacetyl free, but I need to check if Capella New York Cheesecake has any as well.
 
The V2 custard is diacetyl free and all the other Capella flavours mention if there is any diacetyl in them.
 
I figure you've got the proportions inverted - more likely it's NOT found in 75% of eliquids - and as for not taking it seriously - The DA / AP scandal almost killed Five Pawns...
 
Here is a link to the actual study (a decent journalist would have provided this):

http://ehp.niehs.nih.gov/wp-content/uploads/advpub/2015/12/ehp.1510185.acco.pdf

I have only skimmed the article, but you can see in table 3 that the recommended exposure limit over 16 hours is 0.00125 ppm for diacetyl (or 0.00125 mg/L). Given that we breathe about 6000 L of air over 16 hours (source), that comes out at about 7 mg of diacetyl in 16 hours. In the study they are measuring micrograms emitted per cartridge (let's say per 1 mL, though I can't see a definition of cartridge volume in the paper). In order to hit 7 mg within 10 cartridges (let's say 10 mL), you need to be emitting 700 micrograms of diacetyl per cartridge. No liquid tested in the study comes close to that level of emission (see table 2) - the worst liquid would still require you to vape 29 cartridges in 16 hours before hitting the recommended exposure limit, most would require 100s!
 
No concern to me at all. christ we were all taking in massive amounts through smoking, vaping is 95% safer than smoking .
 
No concern to me at all. christ we were all taking in massive amounts through smoking, vaping is 95% safer than smoking .

This is also a very good point that the journalist and even the authors of the scientific paper failed to mention:

One cigarette emits 300-400 micrograms of diacetyl (source). Most of the liquids in the study emit <10 micrograms per cartridge. Even the worst, measuring at 240 micrograms per cartridge, emits almost half as much diacetyl over an entire catridge than one single cigarette.

What the data says (as it always does) is that vaping is far safer than smoking. Yes there are detectable amounts of hazardous chemicals in e-cig vapour, but it is far below the levels in cigarette smoke, and rarely if ever approaches recommended exposure limits for the vaper (and never gets close to concerning for bystanders). Unfortunately that point was missed by the lazy journalist and, sadly, the authors of the study.
 
danb, ladies and gentlemen. Is there some kind of forum knighthood we can bestow?
 
UPDATE: Konstantinos Farsalinos has given his opinion on this study here, which brings up the same points as discussed in this thread.

He also mentions probably the most ridiculous features of the study: Faced with data showing toxin levels well below recommended safety limits, the authors do not conclude that e-cigs appear to be relatively safe (as the data suggest). In what appears to be a desperate and profoundly unscientific attempt to reconcile the data with a predetermined conclusion (e-cigs are dangerous) the data don't support, they argue that the safety limits must be wrong...

They are attempting to make e-cigs look unsafe by changing the definition of safe. This is a political trick - like when governments quietly change the definition of "violent crime" to "non-gang-related violent crime" in order to support the predetermined conclusion of lower violent crime rates.
 
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