5 Myths about Vaping that have been proven wrong

Ever since Vaping has been popular, there’s been countless news stories, articles, publications and various other outlets about the myths and misperceptions surrounding Vaping. But the thing is, a lot of these myths are exactly just that, a myth, doesn’t exist, or urban legend.

In this article, I’m going to look at 5 of the most commonly published myths about vaping that sadly many believe, providing evidence into the fact that these “facts” and misperceptions are nothing but myths! Let’s get into it!

1 – Nicotine is not harmful

There is a hugely common misperception by anti-vaping campaigners, and people who are not educated about Nicotine that Nicotine itself is a harmful chemical, and it’s one of the problematic chemicals in cigarettes that can lead to all of the serious diseases caused by smoking such as cancer, heart disease, and respiratory diseases such as asthma and emphysema.

I’d argue this is one of the biggest myths about vaping that gets published consistently, however, this is wrong as Nicotine is not the cause, nor does it play any part in causing these smoking related diseases. The main perpetrators that causes this problems are the amount of tar that is created by a lit cigarette, which then resides in peoples lungs, and throats, making breathing a lot more difficult.

And also, carbon monoxide, which heavily affects the respiratory system and also can lead to death due to it taking over the oxygen in a persons bloodstream, and with a lack of oxygen getting to the heart and other organs, everything will be put under strain to work harder for the body to function.

When a cigarette is lit, it’s said to contain a minimum of 70 cancer causing chemicals, that I can’t list all of them here as we would be here sometime, but those listed above are the two primary offenders as I said. People often put Nicotine in this category as its found in a tobacco leaf, therefore in cigarettes too, and they automatically assume that Nicotine will cause cancer and other diseases, so people who vape will be prone to it.

WRONG! There has been no scientific nor factual evidence to prove that Nicotine is harmful to the body in anyway, and certainly doesn’t cause the above deadly diseases. Cancer Research UK published a study about vaping and made the statement that Nicotine is not harmful, and for a hugely renowned and respected research team to be saying something like that certainly means it has some weight behind it.

2 – Vaping is absolutely cheaper than smoking

This is one of the most common myths about vaping that is spoken about amongst sceptics is that people will spend the same amount if not more on Vaping than they would if they continued to smoke, and I can clarify and whole heartedly say that you will spend A LOT LESS on vaping than what you would if you continued to smoke.

DID YOU KNOW? The average pack of 20 “tailor made” cigarettes now costs up to £12 a packet! With the average price settling around the £11 mark, which is what we will use for this part of the article.

Now for some quick maths! If a person smokes 20 cigarettes a day, that’s £11 every day, £77 a week, £330 a month! An absolutely astronomical figure when you think about it.

And as a vaper, you can expect to pay £2.50 a week on a new coil for your device, if you bought your vape juice from us here at Vape69 (I mean, why wouldn’t you!) it’ll cost you £1.38 a week for 2 10ml bottles (10ml should last someone 3 days on average, so you’ll need a couple a week)

This means you’re spending £3.88 a week on Vaping, £15.52 a month! That’s less than 5% on what you previously spent a month on cigarettes.

Just think how much this will tally to over the course of a year, two years, and even further.

In times like these, it’s absolutely vital people save as much money as possible to help with the cost of living, and making the change from smoking to vaping can easily help you save money, and fast! So if you’ve seen this myth about vaping and you’re in doubt that Vaping will not be cheaper than smoking, or if anyone tries and tells you different, just reference to the above workings out, and it puts a stop to the wrong beliefs!

3 – You’re not replacing one addiction with another by Vaping

A recent survey released by Action on Smoking and Health looked into the beliefs and perceptions about vaping by Adults in the UK who were either current smokers, ex-smokers, vapers or completely quit.

The study asked current smokers as to the reasons why they would not want to try e-cigarettes to help them quit smoking. Less than a third of smokers in the survey (28%) had not previously tried E-Cigarettes, citing their reason being that they do not want to swap one addiction for another by starting to use E-Cigarettes and opt to continue smoking instead.

This is really sad to read that so many people in this survey, and likely elsewhere around the country/world probably have the same mentality on it. But swapping to an E-Cigarette isn’t really replacing one addiction for another, as E-Cigarettes are effectively a quitting “tool” that helps a lot of people give up smoking, but also reduces down the intense nicotine addiction they might have.

If you are converting from smoking to vaping, you’ll always want to use a vape juice with a nicotine content suited to the amount of nicotine you had previously been getting from smoking cigarettes. This is essential so that it curbs your cravings for nicotine and keeps those chances of relapsing back to smoking at bay.

And by using an e-cigarette, you then have the capability of lowering your nicotine levels in your vape juice gradually over time, and eventually you should hopefully reach the lowest nicotine levels in vape juice possible, and eventually then stop completely. Meaning you have successfully overcome your nicotine addiction, by using an E-Cigarette!  

4 – E-Cigarettes are not a lot more, more, or equally as harmful as Cigarettes

Keeping on the topic of the study mentioned above by Action on Smoking and Health, they also asked current smokers about their perception of harm, and staggeringly enough more than a third of people surveyed believed that E-Cigarettes were a lot more, more or equally harmful as what cigarettes are! And unfortunately, this number has risen each year the survey has taken place, largely down to the myths about vaping that is printed in the media as well as other anti-vaping sites etc.

This comes down to a few news stories that have broken over the last few years, regarding people falling ill through vaping. But people never get the full story, and they’ve developed over time and the full exact story has come out which shows it wasn’t exactly vaping like what you and I would do regularly.

In 2019 there was an outbreak of EVALI in the USA, which I’ve documented in a previous article, where people were admitted with a lung injury caused by Vaping, but what they had been vaping was actually illegal THC containing vape juice, and not the run of the mill shop bought stuff. This news story was EVERYWHERE and caused many people to believe that vaping was the devil personified and could kill people if they did it.

However, vaping conventional nicotine vape juice is not harmful to you as I’ve already stated above. Nobody has ever reported an illness, or died through vaping nicotine e-liquids, and I doubt it’ll happen any time soon. So how can they be more harmful than a cigarette, which contains over 6000 chemicals, 70+ of them being cancer causing? It baffles me how so many people still think Vaping is more harmful than smoking!

5 – Vaping is not a gateway to smoking

Finishing this article with the last one in the most popular myths about vaping stated above, which many people firmly believe that Vaping is a gateway to smoking, which basically means someone who were previously a never smoker starts to vape, and then this would lead to them smoking cigarettes.

This is specifically targeted at young people, as the recent boom in popularity of Disposable Vapes have seen more young people opting to start use them as they are the “in thing” and they had previously never smoked before. Over time, they would become addicted to nicotine and then may potentially turn to smoking cigarettes to get more of a nicotine kick.

However, a recent study based in America looking at the smoking prevalence shows that this gateway theory actually isn’t accurate at all. The statistics show that vaping rates have gone down within the country, and if the theory matches up, it would see smoking rates increase right? Well, wrong in this case, as it also shows smoking rates have dropped down as well, rather than increasing which is what these theorists are suggesting will happen.

Whilst there may be a select few people turn to cigarettes from vaping, it certainly doesn’t deserve to be labelled as a gateway to smoking, and it can keep getting proven wrong by experts and hopefully it’ll stop!

I hope you’ve enjoyed reading this article on the myths about vaping as much as I’ve enjoyed writing it! If you’re someone looking at starting vaping and had any doubts, hopefully I’ve answered all of the biggest concerns you may have and you can rest easy and start on your vaping journey!