Lindsay Lohan and Leonardo DiCaprio love them but are electric cigarettes really as safe as they claim?

By Tom Rawstorne

PUBLISHED: 16:12 EST, 19 May 2013 | UPDATED: 16:12 EST, 19 May 2013

Enjoying a family day out at a fun park over the Bank Holiday weekend, Emma Marshall noticed her daughter Jaimie-Leigh sloping off behind a tree.

Suspicious, the mother of two quickly followed — only to discover that her 14-year-old was illicitly satisfying her secret nicotine addiction.

But this vice had a very modern twist. Because Jaimie-Leigh wasn’t smoking, but rather sucking on the end of an electronic cigarette. The teenager had hoped that the lack of smoke or smell from the gadget would have meant her new-found habit would not be given away. 

They consist of a cartridge containing liquid nicotine and a heating element and Lindsay Lohan and Leonardo DiCaprio can't get enough

‘I was mortified,’ said the care home worker from Castleford, Lancashire. ‘When I confronted her about it she told me she had been using them since January and that they were a lot cheaper and easier to get than real cigarettes. Apparently they are the latest craze and all her mates are doing it.’

It’s therefore no surprise that last week it was revealed that a growing number of schools are banning the devices.

This is because it’s feared that the e-cigarettes — often touted as a device that helps smokers quit — are actually prompting pupils to take up smoking.

Critics point the finger at the fact the devices have no age restrictions on who can buy them, and are available in flavours such as strawberry and chocolate. They warn that they are likely to appeal to children in much the same way as alcopops do.

However, it’s not just youngsters who are taking up the habit. In the five years or so since e-cigarettes became widely available, their popularity has mushroomed.

At the start of 2013, it was estimated that there were 600,000 regular users. By the end of the year that number is expected to be more than a million. Often designed to look like conventional cigarettes, these gadgets are now available in supermarkets, newsagents and garages across the country.

They consist of a cartridge containing liquid nicotine and a heating element. By dragging on one end of the e-cigarette, the nicotine-laced liquid is drawn over the element, turning it into a visible vapour mist that is inhaled and then exhaled.

This produces a relaxing sensation, similar to smoking the real thing but (say manufacturers) without the carcinogenic chemicals created by burning tobacco.

Katherine Heigl is a fan of the product which produces a relaxing sensation, similar to smoking the real thing but (say manufacturers) without the carcinogenic chemicals created by burning tobacco

Those, the marketing spiel says, who switch from smoking to ‘vaping’ — as the habit is known — are able to get their nicotine hit in a healthier way.

E-cigarettes are also not taxed like tobacco, so vaping is much cheaper than smoking. It is claimed that someone with a 20-a-day habit spending roughly £7.50 for a pack could save themselves more than £2,000 a year by switching to electronic cigarettes.

Add in the fact that celebrities including Cheryl Cole, Twilight heart-throb Robert Pattinson and even Leonardo DiCaprio have all been pictured using them, and it’s not surprising sales are booming. 

But if you think a healthy, cheap cigarette sounds too good to be true,  sadly you might well be right.

First, there are concerns about exactly what it is that users, especially teenagers, are inhaling. An analysis of the cartridges carried out in the U.S. found traces of carcinogenic and toxic chemicals, albeit at a much lower concentration than actual cigarettes.

Then there are those who warn that the way e-cigarettes are being marketed is undermining the hard-fought, successful battle to put people off smoking.

E-cigarettes can be used in public places such as bars, restaurants, and on public transport, where tobacco smoking is now illegal. In other words, it’s possible that ‘vaping’ might not just be a ‘gateway’ to tobacco smoking, but a new addiction in itself.

Currently, e-cigarettes do not fall beneath any of the legislative controls in place to deal with conventional tobacco. As well as there being no age limit for e-cigarettes, there are no regulations relating to how they can be marketed.

By contrast, nicotine replacement therapy products such as gum or patches are deemed to be medicines and licensed as healthcare products.

E-cigarettes would be classed alongside them — and need to be licensed — if they too were sold outright as ‘quit smoking’ aids.

But their manufacturers have carefully avoided this, saying instead that their primary purpose is simply as an alternative to smoking tobacco.

Adrian Everett, co-founder and director of E-Lites, which supplies e-cigarettes to 10,000 outlets nationwide including Sainsbury’s and Morrisons, explains: ‘The industry view is that we are not a medicine. I gave up smoking three years ago and use E-Lites all the time. I like the taste of it, because it’s something I’ve done for years.’

It is a point taken up by Katherine Devlin, president of the Electronic Cigarette Industry Trade Association.  ‘Electronic cigarettes allow people to switch to a different way of taking nicotine, which is far safer than continuing to smoke.’

The trouble is that no one can agree on exactly how safe e-cigarettes are. Indeed, they are banned in Brazil and Singapore and subject to medical restrictions in Canada, Australia, France and Japan.
In 2009, concerns about the safety of e-cigarettes were raised in America.

An analysis of e-cigarette products by a government watchdog found diethylene glycol, a toxic chemical, in one cartridge, while tobacco-specific nitrosamines — which can cause cancer — were found in half of the samples.

The tests also suggested that quality control was highly inconsistent, with cartridges bearing the same label emitting markedly different amounts of nicotine.

Then in March, researchers from the University of California found particles of silver, iron, aluminium and silicate, and nanoparticles of tin, chromium and nickel in them. The researchers noted that ‘many of the elements identified are known to cause respiratory distress and disease’.

While the e-cigarette industry says it would welcome the introduction of mandatory age restrictions to prevent children buying e-cigarettes, they argue against licensing them as medicines.

Add in the fact that celebrities including Cheryl Cole, Twilight heart-throb Robert Pattinson and even Leonardo DiCaprio have all been pictured using them, and it's not surprising sales are booming

‘The only people who want to make it a medicine are those in the tobacco industry,’ says Devlin. ‘They know it would close out all the competition and then they could get the whole market share for themselves.’

At the moment, the scale of the market is still relatively small compared with tobacco. In Europe last year, sales of e-cigarettes were in the region of £425 million. That compares with worldwide cigarette sales of more than £350 billion.

But it is predicted that e-cigarettes could account for the equivalent of 40 per cent of all cigarette sales within 20 years. Anti-smoking campaigners are worried that as they grow in popularity they could act as a gateway into smoking for young people who wouldn’t otherwise try cigarettes.

‘We’ve just got used to our children growing up in an environment where smoking is no longer considered “normal”,’ says John Dicey, who runs Allen Carr’s Easyway, an organisation that has been helping smokers quit for the past 30 years.

‘The way e-cigarettes are being advertised in the UK would have you think that they were vitamin supplements, rather than a highly addictive, poisonous drug.

‘The longer this is allowed, the more recruits there will be to the next generation of addicts.’

Another generation of teenagers hiding behind the bike shed — or whatever cover there is on hand  — indulging their addiction to nicotine.