New York University Discovered e-cigarette Can Cause Cancer in Mice
New York University conducted the world’s first experiment to determine the relationship between nicotine and cancer in e-cigarettes. The results of the experiment showed that e-cigarette causes lung cancer in mice and is at risk of developing bladder cancer, destroying their DNA. The researchers therefore concluded that e-cigarettes may also be ‘very harmful’ to humans.
Moon-Shong Tang, the principal researcher of the study, said in an interview: ‘It is foreseeable that if you smoke e-cigarettes, various diseases will appear over time. In the long run, some cancers may appear. Smoke is bad.’
Although the degree of carcinogenicity of e-cigarettes to humans ‘may not be known in the next decade,’ this study is the first to explicitly link e-cigarette vapors to cancer.
A study by the University of Southern California in February found that the electronic tissue of e-cigarette users showed the same molecular changes in patients with cancer-causing patients.
In a New York University study, researchers found that e-cigarette vapor causes DNA damage in the lungs and bladder and ‘inhibits DNA repair in lung tissue.’ In more than 54 weeks of experiments, 22% of the mice exposed to nicotine-containing e-cigarette vapor had lung cancer, and 57.5% had bladder precancerous lesions. None of the 20 mice exposed to nicotine-containing electronic smoke developed cancer.
Tang said the findings suggest that more research is needed on the relationship between e-cigarette use and human cancer. Since the e-cigarette market is still relatively young, it may take another decade to understand its impact on humans more thoroughly. According to his findings in mice, Tang said he does not believe that the study shows that the use of e-cigarettes is safe for humans.
Tang also said that the amount of smoke the rats in the experiment were exposed to was similar to the amount of smoke inhaled by people who used e-cigarettes for three to six years.
The study also found that, like traditional cigarettes, second-hand smoke poses a risk to nearby people.
