Do e-cigarettes cause cancer?

That’s a question we cannot answer yet. Only studies led over several decades will eventually tell us. On the other hand, we already know that vaping does not involve any of the compounds responsible for smoking-related diseases.

So, we can be sure that vaping is far less harmful for your health than smoking. Since 2015, the British Department of Health has estimated that electronic cigarettes are “at least 95% less harmful” than smoking.

No scientific certainty yet

It’s very hard to answer the question of whether vaping can cause cancer, for one simple reason: we have to wait for the results from large-scale, decades-long epidemiological studies to identify any risk factor that definitely causes cancer.

Even though studies like these are under way for e-cigarettes, such as the Cig-Electra study, a longitudinal study of the consumption trajectory for e-cigarettes and tobacco in the CONSTANCES cohort, or the YEMI Marketing study, we’ll have to wait for many years before we have a definitive answer to this question.

That said, we know exactly which factors cause cancer to develop in smokers. The main compound in cigarette smoke that poses a definite risk to smokers is tar. In contrast, e-cigarettes do not contain tobacco and do not involve combustion, so there is no tar in the vapour.

The vapour from e-cigarettes also contains no carbon monoxide, which is found in cigarette smoke and causes numerous cardiovascular diseases. People often tend to think that lung cancer is the only cancer is linked to smoking tobacco. But being a long-term smoker can cause many other cancers. For example, bladder cancer is very common among smokers, as are other cancers such as cancer of the oesophagus, stomach, colon, liver, pancreas and even cervical cancer.

The lack of any tar means that e-cigarette vapour may be seen as significantly less dangerous than the smoke from tobacco cigarettes when it comes to tar-induced cancers.

It’s also important to remember that people around smokers are also exposed to the risk of cancer. Passive smoking is a risk factor recognized by healthcare professionals as a potential cause of lung cancer. The risk of passive smokers contracting lung cancer is estimated to be 30%. This risk is even higher if exposure to tobacco smoke starts during infancy or childhood. Being exposed to passive smoking during infancy unfortunately increases the chances of developing smoking-related diseases.

While no one is certain whether using e-cigarettes causes cancer, they definitely reduce the risks from smoking in a major way. The British Department of Health has stated that vaping reduces the risks from smoking by 95%.

In any case, if you don’t smoke, don’t vape.