Why are electronic cigarettes dangerous?

(Dan Tri) - From cases of e-cigarette poisoning requiring hospitalization, test results show that many products contain new drugs, experts warn of the potential risks of this type of product.

Dr. Nguyen Trung Nguyen, Director of the Poison Control Center (Bach Mai Hospital), said that in cases of hospitalization after smoking electronic cigarettes, many drug samples were found to contain new drugs.

It is worth mentioning that patients shared and bought these products easily on social networks. When they bought the cigarettes to smoke, they did not know that they contained drugs until health problems occurred and they had to be hospitalized for treatment.

Like the case of a 15-year-old student recently treated at the Poison Control Center. The male student was hospitalized after experiencing stomach pain, nausea, sweating, foaming at the mouth, and convulsions in his limbs after smoking an electronic cigarette.

Many young people carelessly smoke electronic cigarettes, unaware of the dangers that this addictive device causes (Photo: MN).

The teenager had a history of vaping for over a year. Recently, through social media, he tried a new type of e-cigarette containing cannabis oil. From the first time he used it, he experienced nausea, dizziness, and weak limbs.

The male patient also shared that he bought this product very easily. He himself knew that e-cigarettes were banned, but he could buy them easily on social networks.

Dr. Nguyen warned that in addition to traditional dangers such as harmful nicotine, the chemicals in e-cigarettes pose a huge risk, because many types of synthetic drugs, synthetic cannabis and new psychoactive substances are being mixed and cleverly disguised in this product.

In the case of this child, a rapid urine test for common drugs was negative, but the tobacco essential oil sample the patient brought in was tested and found to contain 5F-ADB.

This is a new generation of synthetic drugs, with strong effects on the nervous system, mind, cardiovascular system... and its toxicity to the body is not fully known to humans.

According to Dr. Nguyen, the toxicity of new generation synthetic drugs is very complex, affecting many internal organs, both loudly and secretly deceiving patients and doctors.

Even the metabolism of toxins, poisoning the body, and excreting them in the urine is very complicated.

"Testing for toxic substances in patients poisoned by e-cigarettes is extremely difficult. We often have to take samples of the patient's e-cigarettes for testing (because the amount of toxic substances in the cigarette samples is large and in their original form, not yet metabolized). If we take the patient's urine, the toxic substances have already metabolized into other substances, so testing is difficult," Dr. Nguyen shared.

He also expressed concern that children at such a young age are exposed to many toxic substances from e-cigarettes. Toxic substances from nicotine, chemicals, flavors, synthetic drugs... are all harmful to health.

Therefore, parents and schools need to regularly educate children about the harmful effects of cigarettes and e-cigarettes. Strengthen inspection and supervision because e-cigarettes are manufactured very sophisticatedly, "disguised" in many forms such as pens, USB sticks, milk cartons, etc., which can easily fool teachers and parents.

Dr. Nguyen also called on young people not to smoke cigarettes or e-cigarettes because they contain many harmful toxins, not only harmful to themselves, but also to those around them who are negatively affected by secondhand smoke.

Source: https://dantri.com.vn/suc-khoe/vi-sao-thuoc-la-dien-tu-lai-nguy-hiem-20251104132106098.htm