People hooked on vapes try a new way to quit: cigarettes
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People hooked on vapes try a new way to quit: cigarettes
Unofficial Hacker News client; not affiliated with Y Combinator.
sph · · focus · HN ↗
Recently I got the urge to try vaping again, bought all the paraphernalia and started vaping like a chimney 24/7. Got light nicotine poisoning as well. After two days, I caught myself compulsively reaching for the vape.
So I threw everything away and I’m back to patches. Took me a week to forget the compulsive hand-to-mouth urge. I now believe intradermal nicotine is the superior method of administration. At least with cigarettes the smoke is such an intense irritant you self-regulate pretty quickly compared to a cupcake flavoured vape you can just suck on all day long.
cucumber3732842 · · focus · HN ↗
My first thought was "That's a no brainer why didn't I think of that".
Then I remembered that I grew up during peak anti-smoking and so they made nicotine out to be some sort of borderline meth boogeyman rather than just extra addictive extra effective caffeine that comes in bad for your health form factors and that all that propaganda got sent straight to long term memory and I was indoctrinated by it at such a young age it didn't even occur to me to think outside the box like that.
Nicotine patches are expensive for what they are but they're basically free compared to meds.
JauntTrooper · · focus · HN ↗
The research seems to indicate it's a cancer accelerant -- it doesn't cause cancer directly, but it promotes the growth and spread of existing tumors.
Studies suggest it does this through several pathways including:
(a) preventing cancer cells from self-destructing (b) making tumor cells divide more quickly (c) stimulating the growth of new blood vessels in and around tumors, helping them grow; and (d) helping cancer cells metastasize more easily by increasing mobility via epithelial-mesenchymal transition.
It also lowers the effectiveness of chemo and radiotherapy.
Admittedly, most of these are animal/lab studies, in part because it's hard to design a good study in humans since so many patients also use/used cigarettes and vapes, which confounds the results. Still, there's enough evidence out there to be cautious.