COOL

VAPEKIDS“Smoking is Dead!”

SKRILLEX MILEY CYRUS LOUIS C.K. BONO

A Day in the Life of

SPECIAL REPORT

HOW THE CHINESE ARE BUYING AMERICA

MICHAEL JACKSONREBORN

CORRESPONDANCELOVE LETTERS & ADVICE

Yorke PattyTHOM YORKE IS ONE OF THE most seasoned artists around today. In an era of auto tune super stars, it was nice to have a feature with someone like him.-Chris Pedington, Via the Internet

I HAVE A NEWFOUND LOVE for Radiohead, having read the article featured in last months issue. Artists like him deserve the fame. It’s won-derful to read articles like that.-Lloyd Covington Via the Internet

REALLY ENJOYED READINGthe latest article featuring Tom Yorke. It reminded me how hard it was for synth style musicians to break into music. It’s a reminder than every new genre has to elbow into the in-dustry. Sometimes it’s easy to forget even the biggest artists had to work hard to get where they are.-Bill Juvra, Via the Internet

Pot and PanhandlersI USED TO BELIEVE THATmarijuana legalization was the answer to the countries fi nancial problems. However, aft er reading [“Green State”, RS 1208], I am no longer of that notion. It appears that many should reconsider this as an option, or at least come to the discus-sion willing to consider the good as well as the bad.-Scott Dubon, Via the Internet

Going NutsI BELIEVE TIME CAN HEALall wounds, but it just can’t fi x crazy. It seems that Steven Tyler is even crazier now than he was when he still had relevance. It’s just painful watching him age so terribly.-Jessica Draper, Via the Internet

STEVE TYLER IS A WRECK.It’s kind of sad seeing such an icon tumble into pitiful obscurity in the public eye. I would almost feel bad if it didn’t seem like he was thriving on the negative attention.-Graham Luntea, Via the Internet

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WHO&WHAT

Oakland, Calif. — Bran-

don Lockridge and

his electrician-school

classmate stopped into

The Vape Bar in San

Jose, Calif., bellied up to the shiny wooden bar

and ordered the usual.Thunderclouds of vapor soon swirled over the men’s heads, then

vanished like ghosts. This is the world of vaping — puffing on inhalers sometimes known as electronic cigarettes or vape pens. The devices use small batteries to heat a flavored liquid until it produces a vapor. The

liquid may contain varying levels of a nicotine kick, from zero (flavor only) up to 24 milligrams, but no tobacco smoke is produced.

Vaping has become so popular that it’s now an official “scene,” a subculture with its own lingo: Do you wind your coils in bunny ears or roller coasters? Is variable voltage better, or drip style? How about an RBA (rebuildible atomizer) you can tinker with to adjust the draw, and create more flavor and bigger vapor clouds? Users can subscribe to VPR, “the leading Vape lifestyle magazine,” or mingle at a “vape meet.”

“It’s not just the vapor, it’s about the style, being able to have this in your hand,” said Peter Edwards, 29, of San Jose, at The Vape Bar, rolling his e-pen with his fingers like a fine cigar. “Once you spark that button on your pen and you get this going, whether it’s nicotine or marijuana or nothing in it but flavor, it’s cool. You want to be GQ cool.”

Lockridge, 27, credits vaping for reduced nicotine intake — he’s down to 6-milligram juices — but he also just enjoys the bar atmo-sphere, like hanging out at a neighborhood watering hole.

“I like coming in here, talking to people about the pens,” he said, explaining the workings of his device. “This is a single coil. You wrap it, drip the juice on it. I did a lot of research. This one is a second-generation Zmax with a digital display, you can check the battery life. It’s fun to tinker with it.”

Early e-cig prototypes were introduced in the mid-2000s, but refined devices — many manufactured by the big tobacco compa-nies — have grown in popularity worldwide in the past few years.

Butt OutTobacco companies are losing customers on a daily basis. Vaping is the future.

28 ROLLING STONE rollingstone.com July 14, 2014

28 ROLLING STONE rollingstone.comJuly 14, 2014

WHO&WHATVaping has been big in Southern California, and the trend recently

spread to the Bay Area, where you can find at least a dozen dedicated vape shops in San Francisco alone, not to mention e-cig and vaping supplies available at regular smoke shops across the region. Many users also modify the devices to vape marijuana or other drugs.

Some e-cig brands resemble real cigarettes, glowing on the tip when you inhale. Others look like small mechanical cylinders; users joke they’re “Star Wars” light sabers. Some are bejeweled with bling and come in more colors than an iPhone 5C. In the past few months, e-cigarettes have been making news — and not necessarily in a good way.

While proponents rave that they’re a great way to kick the tobacco habit, public health officials and government bodies — from Bay Area cities to state agencies to the FDA — are pushing for more research, possible taxa-tion and regulation under existing tobacco laws.

Some fear the sweet flavors such as bubble gum and blueberry and the appeal-ing lack of cigarette smoke will lure young people into the nicotine habit, even though it’s illegal to sell them to minors. Most shop owners say they ask for ID.

“The act of inhaling anything into the lungs is a concern, particularly if the ingredients are not known,” said oncology resource nurse Kitt Kelly at Sutter Delta Medical Center.

He added that the medical community is reluctant to play “cultural police” and tell adults what to do.

“But we need to be informed, with actual research,” Kelly said. “We need more informa

The question may become more common as electronic cigarettes become more popular. The answer, however, remains elusive. Etiquette aside, the health effects of inhaling nicotine vapor (hence the term) are largely unknown. More research is clearly needed, but in the meantime, the U.S. Food and Drug Ad-ministration has to start regulating e-cig-arettes.

United States consumer„s will spend $1 billpowered smokes this year, 10 times more than they did four years ago. Are e-cigarettes, which come in such flavors as chocolate and butter rum, a benign device to help people stop smoking? Or are they just a new way to feed an old addiction?

How safe, compared with tobacco smoke, is the vapor they create?No one knows. The small studies that have been done so far hint at both pros

and cons; one found that smokers cut back on real cigarettes after trying the electronic kind, while another found particles of metal and silicates in e-cigarette vapor that could cause breathing problems. That there are more than 200 brands containing varying levels of nicotine and other substances only makes it harder to assess their safety.

To begin, e-cigarette makers should be required to report and label all ingredients in the nicotine solutions they use. Even though these deliver fewer poisons than are found in traditional cigarettes, they nevertheless have been found to contain carcinogenic nitrosamines and other harmful impurities derived from the tobacco, as well as the additive diethylene gly-col, an ingredient in antifreeze.

Manufacturers should also disclose the amount of nicotine that can be inhaled from their e-cigarettes. Today’s models haven’t been found to

“Once more is known about the potential hazards of e-cigarette vapors, the FDA may need to restrict certain substances or

place limits on nicotine levels.”

give users as large a hit of nicotine as regular cigarettes do, but that may not always be the case. (Some bottles of solution meant to refill e-cigarette cartridges have been found to contain enough nicotine to kill an adult if ingested.) Once more is known about the potential hazards of e-cigarette vapors, the FDA may need to restrict certain substances or place limits on nicotine levels.

Then there is the issue of flavoring -- something the FDA forbids in standard cigarettes. All electronic cigarettes are flavored, so to ban flavoring would be to ban the product entirely. But it’s possible to allow tobacco- or even mint-flavored e-cigarettes and still ban or restrict flavors designed to appeal to children, hard as they may be to define.

While they’re at it, the FDA should also ban sales to those young-er than 18 and restrict e-cigarette marketing and advertisements in much the same way it limits them for cigarettes. As for health warn-ings, the agency will need to wait for more data before deciding what exactly they should say.

States and cities, meanwhile, should include e-cigarettes in their restrictions on smoking in public places and office buildings, and apply the same rules on the retail sale of e-cigarettes as they do to tobacco products. Even in towns where there are few restrictions, bars and restaurants would be wise to prohibit “vaping” until they know whether it pollutes the air.

On the question of taxes, states and cities may want to act gradu-ally. If e-cigarettes are found to be valuable smoking-cessation tools, then they may warrant a tax rate that’s lower than what’s imposed on real cigarettes.

It would be great if e-cigarettes turned out to be the breakthrough that gets people to give up smoking tobacco. In the meantime, we should all be careful that e-cigarettes not perpetuate a habit that so-ciety has come a long way toward snuffing out. Sensible regulation

can help protect that progress.Heathrow airport has opened what

purports to be the world’s first airport “vaping zone” for smokers of e-ciga-rettes. The room, which is sponsored by a manufacturer of the cigarettes, is in the departure lounge at Terminal 4 and will be restricted to over-18s. The open-ing marks a softening of Heathrow’s tra-ditional stance as a “smoke-free airport”, though the airport stresses that all forms

of smoking remain forbidden everywhere else on the premises.Non-smokers may consider the new facility an irrelevance, but

its introduction underscores the need for clear regulation about the acceptability of e-cigarettes, which vaporise a solution containing nicotine without the toxins from burning tobacco. The devices are—apparently—prohibited on American and European flights. Ameri-ca’s Department of Transportation (DoT) announced plans to ban them in September 2011, but it seems not to have followed up on the move. An investigation earlier this year by “Business Insider” exposed widespread confusion among regulators. The DoT passed the buck to the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA), the civil avi-ation regulator, which responded by saying that airlines are free to set their own guidelines. That contravened an earlier insistence by the DoT that “smoking of electronic cigarettes is already banned” under existing law. Gulliver is no legal expert, but the legislation cited by the DoT (49 USC § 41706 and 14 CFR Part 252) appears

to relate solely to tobacco products, and e-cigarettes do not contain tobacco. It’s all a bit hazy.

So what happens if you start vaping in the skies? Best not to find out. Cloud Nine, a blog about e-cigarettes, has published a non-ex-haustive list of airlines that ban the devices. It could not identify one single carrier that permits them (Ryanair’s allowance of smokeless cig-arettes does not qualify, as they are vapour-free). This has not stopped one e-cigarette manufacturer, Vapestick, publishing guidance on “get-ting away with” vaping during flights–a practice which they insist “isn’t illegal”. Reasoning with cabin crew about the lack of smoke is one ap-proach mentioned. If that fails, try vaping in the toilets. (Gulliver sus-pects this is already commonplace: the vapour produced by e-cigarettes can set off smoke alarms, but often does not.)

It is clear why airlines are not keen on the practice. Health and safety is not the issue. Much like Wetherspoons, a British pub chain, airlines worry that the sight of people puffing away will cause discomfort and confusion. Arguments could easily erupt, and less observant passengers sume that their vapors are not near-

ly as dangerous as tobacco smoke.The FDA’s approach, therefore -- and that of states and cities that reg-

ulate tobacco use -- should be two-pronged: It should find out whether e-cigarettes are indeed safe. And while it does, it should ensure that “va-ping” remains restricted to adults who are fully informed of the potential risks.

To begin, e-cigarette makers should be required to report and label all ingredients in the nicotine solutions they use. Even though these deliver fewer poisons than are found in traditional cigarettes, they nevertheless have been found to contain carcinogenic nitrosamines and other harmful impurities derived from the tobacco, as well as the additive diethylene gly-col, an ingredient in antifreeze.

Manufacturers should also disclose the amount of nicotine that can be inhaled from their e-cigarettes. If you want a truly frustrating job in public health, try getting people to stop smoking. Even when re-searchers combine counseling and encouragement with nicotine patches and gum, few smokers quit.

Recently, though, experimenters in Italy had more success by doing less. A team led by Riccardo Polosa of the University of Catania recruited 40 hard-core smokers — ones who had turned down a free spot in a smoking-cessation program — and simply gave

them a gadget already available in stores for $50. This electronic cigarette, or e-cigarette, contains a small reservoir of liquid nicotine solution that is vaporized to form an aerosol mist.

The user “vapes,” or puffs on the vapor, to get a hit of the ad-dictive nicotine (and the familiar sensation of bringing a cigarette to one’s mouth) without the noxious substances found in cigarette smoke.

After six months, more than half the subjects in Dr. Polosa’s experiment had cut their regular cigarette consumption by at least 50 percent. Nearly a quarter had stopped altogether. Though this was just a small pilot study, the results fit with other encouraging evidence and bolster hopes that these e-cigarettes could be the most effective tool yet for reducing the global death toll from smoking.

But there’s a powerful group working against this innovation — and it’s not Big Tobacco. It’s a coalition of government officials and antismoking groups who have been warning about the dangers of e-cigarettes and trying to ban their sale.

The controversy is part of a long-running philosophical debate about public health policy, but with an odd role reversal. In the past, conservatives have leaned toward “abstinence only” policies for dealing with problems like teenage pregnancy and heroin addiction, while liberals have been open to “harm reduction” strategies like encouraging birth control and dispensing methadone.

When it comes to nicotine, though, the abstinence forces tend to be more liberal, including Democratic officials at the state and national level who have been trying to stop the sale of e-cigarettes and ban their use in smoke-free places. They’ve argued that smokers who want an alternative source of nicotine should use only thor-oughly tested products like Nicorette gum and prescription patches — and use them only briefly, as a way to get off nicotine altogether.

The Food and Drug Administration tried to stop the sale of e-cigarettes by treating them as a “drug delivery device” that could not be marketed

until its safety and efficacy could be demonstrated in clinical trials. The agency was backed by the American Cancer Society, the American Heart Association, Action on Smoking and Health, and the Center for Tobacco-Free Kids.

The prohibitionists lost

that battle last year, when the F.D.A. was overruled in court, but they’ve continued the fight by publicizing the supposed perils of e-cigarettes. They argue that the devices, like smokeless tobacco, reduce the incentive for people to quit nicotine and could also be a “gateway” for young people and nonsmokers to become nicotine ad-dicts. And they cite an F.D.A. warning that several chemicals in the vapor of e-cigarettes may be “harmful” and “toxic.” But the agency has never presented evidence that the trace amounts actually cause any harm, and it has neglected to mention that similar traces of these chemicals have been found in other F.D.A.-approved products, including nicotine patches and gum. The agency’s methodology and warnings have been lambasted in scientific journals by Dr. Polosa and other researchers, including Brad Rodu, a professor of medicine at the University of Louisville in Kentucky.

Writing in Harm Reduction Journal this year, Dr. Rodu con-cludes that the F.D.A.’s results “are highly unlikely to have any possi-ble significance to users” because it detected chemicals at “about one million times lower concentrations than are conceivably related to human health.” His conclusion is shared by Michael Siegel, a profes-sor at the Boston University School of Public Health.

“It boggles my mind why there is a bias against e-cigarettes among antismoking groups,” Dr. Siegel said. He added that it made no sense to fret about hypothetical risks from minuscule levels of several chemicals in e-cigarettes when the alternative is known to be deadly: cigarettes containing thousands of chemicals, including dozens of carcinogens and hundreds of toxins.

Both sides in the debate agree that e-cigarettes should be studied more thoroughly and subjected to tighter regulation, including quality-control standards and a ban on sales to minors. But the harm-reduction side, which includes the American Association of Public Health Physicians and the American Council on Science and Health, sees no reason to prevent adults from using e-cigarettes. In Britain, the Royal College of Physicians has denounced “irrational and immoral” regulations inhibiting the introduction of safer nico-tine-delivery devices.

The user “vapes,” or puffs on the vapor, to get a hit of the ad-dictive nicotine (and the familiar sensation of bringing a cigarette to one’s mouth) without the noxious substances found in cigarette smoke.

28 ROLLING STONE rollingstone.com July 14, 2014

The Food and Drug Administration tried to stop the sale of e-cigarettes by treating them as a drug delivery

service...

28 ROLLING STONE rollingstone.comJuly 14, 2014