• Viking_Hippie@lemmy.world
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    7 months ago

    TL;DR: That article is absolute garbage.

    It only makes it through one small paragraph (which is itself a vague lie) before its first specific and ridiculous lie: claiming that a hookah is an early form of vape 🤦

    It then links to a 2019 study of mice that, in spite of setting out with a clear confirmation bias, admits that their results showed more cases of cancer-like cell behavior in the mice subjected to tobacco than the ones subjected to e-liquid.

    Add to that the fact that they don’t reveal their methodology (beyond the fact that they subjected the mice to their experiments for a full year, which is much longer than most people tend to vape when using it for smoking cessation) and that study is basically useless for proving the hypothesis.

    The heavy metals inhalation they then go on to warn about is impossible in real life conditions as the heat required for that to happen simply cannot be achieved by the suction power any human can achieve and, even if you could somehow achieve that, you’d suffer severe burns causing you to stop immediately.

    • pearsaltchocolatebar@discuss.online
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      7 months ago

      I mean, hookah was an early form of vaping. You use coals to indirectly heat tobacco to vaporize the nicotine and flavor carrier.

      Everything else is accurate, though.

    • TimewornTraveler@lemm.ee
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      7 months ago

      Good lookin’ all around except I’d dispute this claim:

      (beyond the fact that they subjected the mice to their experiments for a full year, which is much longer than most people tend to vape when using it for smoking cessation)

    • gamermanh@lemmy.dbzer0.com
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      7 months ago

      I’m 100% with you on the health stuff, but out of genuine curiosity:

      its first specific and ridiculous lie: claiming that a hookah is an early form of vape

      It is, though? You might think of an e-cig when you hear “vape” but it’s short for “vaporization” or “vaporizer”, which are actually different from smoking.

      In smoking you light the material itself on fire and draw the smoke produced by the active incineration of the material into your lungs.

      In vaping you heat the air around a substance (even loose plant material) and cause the actual material to vaprize, not incinerate, and you inhale that vapor, not smoke.

      The key differences being a lack of tar and similar gunk from the actual flame, despite seeming like a mere semantic difference there are actual physical differences.

      It’s been a while since I saw a hookah in action, but my understanding is that they heat up the air with charcoal and that you then draw that past the tobacco and through water before it goes into your lungs. That’s the exact same thing my Ditanium desktop vaporizer does, except it uses a quartz heater and not charcoal. The plant matter itself doesn’t burn, so no tar. Maybe some from the charcoal, but even then the claim that it’s an early version of what is today called vaping is probably a fair assessment.