Small Study Finds That Vaping Improves Blood Vessel Elasticity in Smokers
The cardiovascular system is one of the most affected by prolonged tobacco smoking, but a small Greek study shows that vaping can considerably improve arterial elasticity in smokers in just a few months.
Researchers from the cardiology, hematology and pharmacology departments of the National and Kapodistrian University of Athens conducted a small study entitled “Effects of Electronic Cigarette on Platelet and Vascular Function After Four Months of Use” to measure the impact of switching to vaping over continuing to smoke cigarettes for a period of four months. The detailed findings of this research are scheduled to be published in July of this year, but the main results have already been outlined in pre-published study abstract.
The team, coordinated by Ignatios Ikonomidis, Associate Professor of Cardiology at National and Kapodistrian University of Athens, randomized 40 smokers that didn’t suffer from any cardiovascular diseases into two groups – one that continued to smoke conventional tobacco cigarettes, and another that switched to an electronic cigarette (nicotine concentration of 12mg/ml) – for a period of four months.
A series of parameters were measured both at baseline and deadline, and the results were then analyzed and compared between the two groups. Some of the findings highlighted in the abstract include:
— the continued impairment of platelet function in the group that kept smoking over the four months, compared to vaping, which had a “neutral effect on platelet aggregation of healthy smokers”;
— further impairment of arterial elasticity and oxidative stress in the group that smoked cigarettes, compared to a clear improvement of arterial elastic properties and oxidative stress in the group that vaped;
— compared to smoking, vaping resulted in a greater reduction of exhaled CO, and an improvement of pulse wave velocity (the speed at which the blood pressure pulse propagates through the circulatory system).
While we still have to wait a couple of months for the complete study to be published, I think it’s safe to say that this research acts as further proof that vaping is a safer alternative to smoking tobacco, at least from the perspective of the cardiovascular function.
The study does have a at least one very clear limitation in the very limited test subject pool, but you have to keep in mind that it was carried out by a team of scientists at a public university in Greece, so they probably didn’t have the funds to put together an operation on the scale that researchers in the U.S. can. Sadly, on the other side of the Atlantic, no one seems to be interested in objective studies on vaping vs smoking, anymore. It’s all about the youth vaping epidemic, the completely misreported EVALI crisis, and most recently the yet unproven and completely baseless warnings about exacerbated Covid-19 symptoms in vapers.
Oh, and you’re probably never going to read about this study on mainstream news websites, unfortunately. If the results were negative, the would have been all over it already, but they have no interest in painting vaping in a favorable light.
Interestingly, earlier this month, a study funded through grants to the American Heart Association found vaping to be as harmful for blood vessels as smoking tobacco. Despite its questionable findings, which went against most other scientific research, dozens of major news sites picked it up the same day it was published…
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