'It's just not worth it": Teen hospitalized from vaping campaigns to ban flavored products

Record ID: 1433250

  • Title: 'It's just not worth it": Teen hospitalized from vaping campaigns to ban flavored products
  • Date: 20th September 2019
  • Summary: LOS ANGELES, CALIFORNIA, UNITED STATES (FILE - SEPTEMBER 12, 2019) (REUTERS) VARIOUS OF PEOPLE SMOKING VAPE ON HOLLYWOOD BOULEVARD
  • Embargoed: 4th October 2019 10:21
  • Keywords: Vaping teen ban lung illness
  • Location: LOS ANGELES, CALIFORNIA, UNITED STATES; NEW YORK, NEW YORK, UNITED STATES; ENCINITAS, CALIFORNIA, UNITED STATES;
  • City: LOS ANGELES, CALIFORNIA, UNITED STATES; NEW YORK, NEW YORK, UNITED STATES; ENCINITAS, CALIFORNIA, UNITED STATES;
  • Country: USA
  • Topics: Health/Medicine
  • Reuters ID: LVA00AAXGOND3
  • Aspect Ratio: 16:9
  • Story Text: U.S. health officials said on Thursday (September 19) there were now 530 confirmed and probable cases and seven deaths from severe lung-related illnesses tied to vaping, with no signs the outbreak is easing.
    That is up from 380 cases reported a week ago as health officials link more illnesses and deaths to vaping. Three-fourths of the cases are male, and two-thirds are between the ages of 18 and 34.
    Although most of the affected have remained anonymous, one of the sufferers took to social media to announce her adversity to vaping and e-cigarettes. Simah Herman from Los Angeles posted a picture of herself holding up a sign reading "I want to start a no vaping campaign" after waking from a medically induced coma from her hospital bed.
    "While I was doing it, I had no idea where it would lead me but once I was in that position I knew immediately that was what it was and I knew that all my friends were doing it at that time so I wrote that sign and put it on Snapchat story just to warn them, " 18-year-old Herman told Reuters from her family home
    Herman spent two years suffering from nausea and migraines and was told it was likely she was suffering from a mental illness, which her mother Stacy presumed was anorexia as the teenager continued to not eat and lose weight.
    "Every hospital and every doctor's office I went into, I told my doctors that I was doing it and they all brushed it off as if it were nothing. What teenager doesn't do it?" Herman said.
    Herman got into vaping through a friend of hers as she enjoyed the flavors and thought it wasn't that that harmful but now, having gone through her ordeal, she realizes the futility of it all.
    "They're advertised as a healthy alternative to smoking but I feel like if someone is trying to go off cigarettes, they don't need a mango flavored vape, they just need the nicotine at that point because that's what's addicting and they slowly go off of it. I slowly raised my nicotine levels because I got used to it and wanted it more and we all thought that like in cigarettes, the tobacco part is what's bad for you, the nicotine is just what's addicting so we knew that we were getting ourselves into an addiction but we didn't really have a problem with it. We just brushed it off as if it were nothing."
    Her mother, Stacy, said she was "pissed" about the situation as she couldn't see the warning signs that anything was wrong.
    "It smells like she's playing with the body spray from Bed, Bath & Beyond. It smells like she's using perfume. It doesn't smell bad. I never saw smoke. Her room didn't have fumes coming out of it - nothing weird," she told Reuters.
    Herman agrees with the idea that flavored vapes and e-cigarettes should be banned.
    "We know what's going to happen with cigarettes, nobody knows what's going to happen to your body or your lungs when vaping," Herman said.
    Stacy said the doctors at UCLA carried the same fears.
    "It's like you're cooking French fries, you cook them in the pot, you make your French fries in the hot oil and that oil that's left, you leave it in the fridge, that oil is going to congeal and it's going to turn into a solid fat. Well, that solid fat coating your lungs makes it really hard to breathe," Stacy said.
    Herman has continued her pledge to try and ban flavored vapes and e-cigarettes and wants to raise money for research into the side effects. But, she also wants to warn people like her to act fast if they are vapers and are suffering from lung issues.
    "It's just not worth it. At any point, your lungs can start failing on you and you have no idea it's happening until the point where you can't take your last breath," Herman said.
    The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) has confirmed seven people have died from vaping-related illness. The confirmed deaths were reported in California (2), Illinois, Indiana, Kansas, Minnesota and Oregon.
    "We do expect others," Dr. Anne Schuchat, principal deputy director of the CDC, told reporters, referring to the number of deaths.
    (Production: Rollo Ross)
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