10.2. SR 09-08-2015 - Laserfiche WebLink

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E-cigarettes: an evidence update 65 nicotine than cigarette exhalations [78]. Estimating environmental nicotine exposure, however, has to take into account the fact that side -stream smoke (ie the smoke from the lighted end of the cigarette, which is produced regardless of whethe r the smoker is puffing or not) accounts for some 85% of passive smoking and there is no side-stream EC vapour. A study measuring nicotine residue on surfaces in houses of smokers and vapers reported only negligible levels from vaping, 169 times lower than from smoking [79]. Colard et al., 2015 describe a model for estimating environmental workplace exposure [80]. The model predicts much lower nicotine exposure from vaping than from smoking, at levels negligible in health terms. Goniewicz and Lee 2014 found that nicotine from EC vapour gets deposited on surfaces, but at very low levels [81]. This poses no concerns regarding exposure to bystanders. At the highest concentration recorded (550 μg/m 2), an infant would need to lick over 30 square metres of exposed surface to obtain 1mg of nicotine. Ballbe et al., 2014 provide the most informative data collected to date as this study measured the actual levels of airborne nicotine in homes of ex-smokers who live either with smokers (N=25) or with vapers (N=5) and also in 24 control homes [82]. The study also measured salivary and urinary cotinine in partners of smokers and vapers. As expected, there was little nicotine in non-smokers’ homes. The air in the homes of vapers contained six times less nicotine than the air in the homes of smokers. There was less of a difference between cotinine levels of partners of vapers and smokers (1.4 to 2 fold difference), most likely due to some ‘ex-smokers’ still occasionally smoking, but even with this possible contamination, the nicotine levels absorbed via passive vaping were negligible. Partners of vapers had mean cotinine concentrations of 0.19 ng/ml in saliva and 1.75 ng/ml in urine, which is about 1,000 times less than the concentrations seen in smokers and similar to levels generated by eating a tomato [83]. Summary EC release negligible levels of nicotine into ambient air with no identified health risks to bystanders. Nicotine in e-liquids Fourteen studies tested more than 400 different e-liquids, mainly to check the accuracy of product labelling. Their results are summarised in Table 6, updated from an earlier review by Cheng et al., 2014 [84].