Mint vapes damage lungs more than any other flavor, warn scientists.
The flavor produces more toxic microparticles compared to menthol-free liquids.
Mint vape fans took shallower breaths and had poorer lung function than other smokers - regardless of how long they smoked cigarettes, whether they used cannabis-laced vaping products, and their age, gender, and race.
Scientists warn the minty flavor could be as dangerous as cannabinoid vapes which have been strongly linked to lung injury.
This comes amid the U.S. Food and Drug Administration's (FDA) continuing pressure on cigarette manufacturers to ban menthol in regular tobacco products including cigarettes and cigars.
In doing so the federal agency is trying to curb preventable deaths.
Yet the vape market is spiraling, with mint flavors highly popular among the 2.5 million young people who reported smoking e-cigarettes in 2022.
Medical researchers are struggling to keep up with the market.
“Just because something is safe to consume as food does not mean that it’s safe to inhale.
“The main message that we want to put out there is for people, especially young adults, who haven’t smoked before.
“Switching to e-cigarettes may be a better, safer alternative for someone who is trying to quit smoking regular tobacco products.
"But it’s important to have full knowledge of e-cigarettes’ risks and benefits before trying them.”
The University of Pittsburgh researchers developed a “vaping robot” to measure the health toll of different flavors.
The bot created to combat current limits in vape research can precisely mimic the temperature, humidity, puff volume and duration.
In doing so, the invention simulates healthy and diseased breathing patterns to reliably predict just how toxic each e-cigarette is for the lungs.
Prior to this, scientists were struggling to keep step with the burgeoning vape market.
Traditional investigations into vape safety are hampered by toxicity testing taking weeks or months to produce clinically relevant data.
Animals or living cells grown on a flat surface, are tested to analyze aerosol products' safety and biological impact.
But mice and rats have different nasal passages to humans, preventing them from taking an active breath through the mouth like a cigarette puff.
Cell systems in the test bunnies are either directly exposed to e-liquid on contact or blasted with continuous aerosols - neither account for human breathing patterns.
The new robot can measure the size and number of vape particles, and how these may vary from flavor to flavor.
The vape-particle numbers can then be engineered and applied to model lungs - or “lung-on-chip” devices - to quickly yield high-quality data indicating potential toxicity.
Previously, Professor Benam’s team discovered vitamin E acetate, a common additive in cannabinoid e-cigarette liquids, generates more toxic small particles.
These particles can travel deep inside the lung and wedge themselves in the narrowest airways and lining of the walls of the trachea and bronchus.
This study in the journal Respiratory Research suggests menthol additives could be just as dangerous as vitamin E acetate - strongly linked with lung injury in e-cigarette and vape users.
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