High levels of sweet and fruit flavor chemicals have been used in tobacco-flavored e-cigarettes in a bid to make them more appealing to young people.
Through scanning extensive data, researchers found evidence that sweet chemicals had been added to tobacco-flavored e-liquids.
They believe this is in response to the US Food and Drug Administration’s (FDA) ban on the sale of all flavored e-cigarettes apart from menthol or tobacco, with the aim to put young people off vaping, allowing companies to get round it.
They compared the number and amount of flavor chemicals in 63 tobacco-flavored e-cigarette fill fluids that were bought between 2011 and 2019. They also looked into two popular pod-style e-cigarette brands – JUUL and Puff.
Puff is particularly popular with young people, and currently isn’t covered by the FDA’s ban.
Tobacco-flavored products purchased in 2010 and 2011 had very few flavor chemicals, and the levels of each one were generally very low.
Nearly two-thirds of the refill fluids bought before 2019 had levels of flavor chemicals below two mg/ml, and 84 percent were below five mg/ml.
This differed to the number and level found in the ones bought in 2019.
Among the 13 refill products bought in 2019, the level of flavor chemicals were above 10 mg/ml.
These products contained one to five dominant flavor chemicals, which were predominantly fruity and sweet.
Out of all the e-cigarettes, 60 percent used ethyl maltol, a sweet or caramel flavor, 44 percent used corylone, a maple-like flavor, 33 percent used menthol, 25 percent used vanillin and 24 percent used the fruity and creamy flavor of maltol and triacetin.
All these flavors, apart from menthol, are typically used in sweet-flavored e-cigarette liquids popular with young vapers, such as Dewberry Cream.
“Concern has been raised previously about the safety of flavor chemicals when inhaled at these high concentrations," said Dr. Esther Omaiye, from the department of molecular, cell and systems biology at the University of California Riverside, and author of the study.
“Although these particular flavors are generally regarded as safe by the Flavor Extract Manufacturers Association (FEMA) for ingestion, FEMA has not evaluated them for inhalation toxicity.”
Overall, nine sweet and fruit flavor chemicals, used mainly in products bought in 2016 and 2019, were at levels above two mg/ml.
The vape brand JUUL has two tobacco flavors, Classic and Virginia.
The total of flavor chemical levels for both these products were below 0.35 mg/ml, while levels of each individual chemical was, in most cases, equal to, or less than, 0.05 mg/ml.
Yet there were different flavors in them both, suggesting that they were added to create a distinct taste for each.
Puff's tobacco flavor was a different story, with 27 flavors being added up to a total of 34.3 mg/ml.
The amount of each individual chemical ranged from 0.03 to 15 mg/ml.
In Puff e-cigarettes, levels of vanillin were 300 times higher than in JUUL, while ethyl maltol was 239 times higher, and corylone was 41 times higher.
And in total, the number of flavor chemicals used in Puff Bar Tobacco was greater than those found in 94 percent of the refill fluids studied.
“It is important for the FDA to identify and quantify flavor chemicals before authorizing Premarket Tobacco Applications (PMTA) for two reasons," Omaiye said.
“First, flavor chemicals are often used in e-liquids without safety data at concentrations much higher than those found in other consumer products. Second, our data show that e-cigarette manufacturers are manipulating e-liquid formulations apparently to circumvent flavor chemical regulations.”
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