Genetic Mutations Not Induced By E-Cigarettes

Highlights

Researchers used Ames test, that uses bacteria, to compare the mutagenic potential of cigarette smoke with that of e-cigarette vapor.
Exposure to cigarette smoke was seen to cause mutations in both bacterial strains within 24 minutes of exposure.
E-cigarette vapor extracts did not cause the bacteria to mutate, even after three hours of continuous exposure.
E-cigarettes have the potential to be significantly less harmful compared to cigarette smoke.

”Cigarettes are a classy way to commit suicide.”- Kurt Vonnegut

E-cigarette vapor does not induce DNA mutations commonly observed with tobacco smoke exposures in lab-based tests.

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‘E-cigarettes are much safer, about 95%, than smoking tobacco cigarettes and hence they should be widely promoted as an alternative to cigarettes’

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Many in the public health community believe e-cigarettes offer great potential for reducing the public health impact of smoking.

Scientists at British American Tobacco used a method called the Ames test to compare the mutagenic potential of cigarette smoke with that of vapor from Vype ePen, a commercially available e-cigarette.

Cigarette Smoking Statistics in USA

Tobacco use remains the single largest preventable cause of death and disease in the United States.
Cigarette smoking kills more than 480,000 Americans each year, with more than 41,000 of these deaths from exposure to secondhand smoke.
Smoking-related illness in the United States costs more than $300 billion a year, including nearly $170 billion in direct medical care for adults and $156 billion in lost productivity.
In 2014, an estimated 16.8% (40.0 million) U.S. adults were current cigarette smokers. Among them, 76.8% (30.7 million) smoked every day, and 23.2% (9.3 million) smoked some days.

DNA mutations result in genetic instability, which may be involved in the development of cancer.

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The Ames test is widely used method that uses bacteria to test whether a given chemical or drug causes mutations in the bacteria's DNA.

The standard test involves five bacterial strains.

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In this study, two of these bacteria were used Salmonella typhimurium strains TA98 and TA100, both of which are effective at screening 90-95% of potential mutagens.

TA98 and TA100 have been used widely to assess tobacco smoke, but never for the assessment of freshly generated e-cigarette aerosols, until now.

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More than one million Indians reportedly die annually because of smoking, making it the fourth leading cause of death due to non-communicable diseases (NCD).

Traditionally, the particulate matter in smoke is assessed, but this is only a small fraction of the tobacco smoke.

To more accurately reflect real-life exposure, whole smoke was also tested.

The researchers tested both the particulate matter and whole aerosol of smoke from a reference cigarette 3R4F and vapor from Vype ePen.

For the process, they trapped particulate matter from smoke or vapor on a filter pad and then washed the pad with a solvent to produce a stock solution that could be diluted into various concentrations.

They then exposed the test bacteria to the same concentrations of either smoke or vapor extract.

They also exposed test bacteria to freshly generated smoke or e-cigarette vapor.

Exposure to smoke was seen to cause mutations in both bacterial strains in a dose-dependent manner - the higher the dose, the higher the mutation rate.

Whole smoke took just 24 minutes to cause mutations.

E-cigarette vapor extracts, gave no response, and whole vapor did not cause the bacteria to mutate, even after three hours of continuous exposure, which was comparable to the results obtained from air and untreated controls.

'These findings suggest that Vype ePen vapour does not induce the mutations observed on exposure to smoke,' said Dr James Murphy, Head of Reduced Risk Substantiation at British American Tobacco.

'This study adds data to support the growing evidence base that e-cigarettes have the potential to be significantly less harmful compared to cigarette smoke, though more research is needed' he said.

Public Health England, an executive body of the UK Department of Health, recently published a report saying that e-cigarettes are 95% safer than cigarettes.

The Royal College of Physicians have said that the public can be reassured that e-cigarettes are much safer then smoking and that they should be widely promoted as an alternative to cigarettes, but called for more research to be done on the potential long term effects of using e-cigarettes.

The results are published in Mutation Research/Genetic Toxicology and Environmental Mutagenesis.

References

Burden of Tobacco Use in the US - (http://www.cdc.gov/tobacco/campaign/tips/resources/data/cigarette-smoking-in-united-states.html)

Source-Medindia