Findings build on growing evidence that adding flavours to vaping solutions can increase the dangers.
Berry-flavoured vapes can weaken the lungs’ natural defences, making it harder for the body to fight off infections, new research suggests.
The study compared effects of flavoured e-cigarettes to those of unflavoured ones.
While previous research has shown that all forms of vaping can be harmful, the scholars said this study adds to a mounting body of evidence demonstrating how added flavourings to vaping solutions can exacerbate the dangers.
Inspired by a series of reported lung injury cases in teenagers in 2019, McGill Assistant Professor Ajitha Thanabalasuriar in the Department of Pharmacology & Therapeutics, in collaboration with Erika Penz from the University of Saskatchewan, exposed mice to e-cigarette vapour over several days and used a live imaging technique to observe their lung immune cells in real time.
The study, published in PNAS, showed that specific chemicals in the berry vapes paralyze immune cells in the lungs responsible for clearing out harmful particles, leaving the body more vulnerable to respiratory infections. The unflavoured ones did not have that effect.
“We need to be careful about the types of flavours that we’re including in these products. They can have detrimental effects. I think that’s really the take-home message, especially some of these vaping products that are marketed for kids — the way they’re sold, the type of containers they are sold in — it’s very colourful, it’s really attractive to children, and this can be a really bad thing for our future,” she said.
More work is needed to pinpoint the specific compounds in berry-flavoured vapes responsible for impairing immune cells and to confirm whether the effects observed in mice also occur in humans, she noted.
While smoking rates are declining, more than one in five young adults ages 18 to 24 vape in Quebec, according to provincial data.
The study was funded by the Canadian Institute of Health Research, the McGill Interdisciplinary Initiative in Infection and Immunity, and the Canadian Research Chair research allowance.
