Study finds vaping causes Asthma in kids
Texas - Vaping is known to cause a host of health problems. Now certain researchers are adding asthma to that list.
It is a multi-billion dollar business and a large percentage of the people purchasing e-cigarettes are kids who erroneously believe vaping is somehow safer than conventional cigarettes.
"Although e-cigarettes have fewer toxins than regular cigarettes, they still contain a mixture of harmful chemicals such as flavoring chemicals and heavy metals. So this increases the risk of respiratory diseases, as well as cancer," says Dr. Taehyun Roh, who’s a School of Public Health Professor at Texas A&M University.
Roh just completed a study of 32,000 teens across America, and he says one of the respiratory diseases vaping causes in kids is asthma.
"We found vaping increases chances of kids getting asthma by 32%, putting them more at risk of developing asthma in adolescence," Dr Roh explains. He says, "Those adolescents who used conventional cigarettes, alcohol and other substances or who had depression were more likely to use e-cigarettes."
Kids often vape, according to Dr. Roh, as a mental health coping mechanism and his research finds white boys are more likely to vape than other kids.
"One interesting thing we found was Hispanic adolescents in Texas were less likely to use e-cigarettes compared to their white peers, but we need further research to find the reason for that."
Just like second hand cigarette smoke causes health problems, Dr. Roh says the same is true for e-cigarettes.