The federal Centers for Disease Control have opened an investigation into a mysterious wave of severe pulmonary problems across several states over the past weeks \u2014 principally in the Midwest, principally affecting young people and seemingly linked to vaping.\u00a0<\/p>\n
The CDC announced its investigation in a\u00a0statement<\/a>\u00a0Aug. 17. It noted that \u201c94 possible cases of severe lung illness associated with vaping were reported in 14 states from June 28, 2019, to August 15, 2019.\u201d Wisconsin has been hit the hardest, with 30 cases reported.\u00a0 The CDC is also working with local health authorities to try to get to the bottom of the phenomenon in Illinois, Indiana, Minnesota and California.<\/p>\n Local doctors are, in most cases, not clear on what the victims had been inhaling. \u00a0Wisconsin health officials said that \u201c[t]he products consumed could include a number of substances, including nicotine, THC, synthetic cannabinoids or a combination of these.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n The North Carolina Department of Health also reports three cases in the state, and has\u00a0issued a recommendation<\/a>\u00a0that consumers of vaping products stop using them while authorities investigate. JUUL also emphasized that some reports indicated patients had used THC, \u201ca Schedule I, controlled substance that we do not sell.\u201d While noting the issue of unregulated knockoff products, the statement echoed prohibitionist assumptions: \u201cWe also must ensure illegal products, such as counterfeit, copycat, and those that deliver controlled substances, stay out of the market and away from youth.\u201d<\/p>\n Yet, once again, prohibition may actually be a big part of the problem. In one of the states where the grisly incidents have been reported, California, vape pens are available on the regulated market. But in most of the rest, they are not \u2014 certainly not in Wisconsin, where the greatest number of such cases are reported.\u00a0<\/p>\n The laws governing cannabis extracts\u00a0vary from state to state<\/a>. And in states where marijuana is still illegal, vape pens are popular thanks to their relative lack of smell and resemblance to cartridges containing nicotine. But, by definition, the cartridges are not regulated by any authority in these states.<\/p>\n In a particularly strange irony, many of these potentially dangerous knockoffs are apparently being produced in China for the American illicit market, making this a case of Chinese capitalism exploiting American prohibition.<\/p>\n Chapman told NBC that the four teens admitted to Children\u2019s Minnesota all arrived with what staff originally assumed was a bad respiratory infection, such as pneumonia. This was ruled out when instead of getting better with treatment, they got worse.\u00a0<\/p>\n \u201cThey have progressed to have significant difficulty with their breathing and increasing lung distress,\u201d Chapman said. \u201cThey\u2019ve ended up needing our intensive care unit and in some cases assistance with their breathing.\u201d<\/p>\n Physicians in the other states report similar situations. \u201cAll patients reported vaping prior to their hospitalization, but we don\u2019t know all the products they used,\u201d Andrea Palm of the Wisconsin Department of Health Services told the NBC affiliate in Green Bay, Wisconsin.\u00a0<\/p>\n One such unfortunate patient is Dylan Nelson, 26, of Burlington, Wisconsin. He began feeling sick after taking a few hits from a new vape cartridge. The next morning, he went to the hospital and his condition continued to deteriorate throughout the day. By evening, his lungs were filling with fluid and doctors had to put him into a medically induced coma. He has since been discharged and is slowly recovering. His brother, Patrick DeGrave, told NBC that Nelson bought his vape cart off the street \u2014 not from a reputable shop.<\/p>\n DeGrave got to what may well be the root of the problem: \u201cPeople will buy them from the states where it is legal and they\u2019ll bring them back to states such as Wisconsin where it\u2019s not legal,\u201d he said. \u201cYou don\u2019t know if you\u2019re buying something from a middle man that picked it up from a dispensary or if you\u2019re buying it from somebody who has tampered with it and made their own mixture.\u201d<\/p>\n Manufacturers of vape carts filled with cannabis distillate are facing something of a crisis as the market has been\u00a0flooded with counterfeit products<\/a>. These contraband knockoffs are apparently fooling many consumers, but may contain toxin-laden and adulterated substances. Industry voices are urging buyers to beware.\u00a0<\/p>\n Producers of e-cigarettes have, of course, been quick to distance their products from the dab carts, although e-cigs face controversies of their own. As\u00a0Ars Technica<\/a>\u00a0notes, their proponents argue that vaping nicotine is significantly safer than smoking cigarettes, and can even help smokers kick their habit, But some companies have faced harsh criticism over charges that they are marketing their products to teenagers, contributing to what the FDA has called an \u201cepidemic of youth e-cigarette use.\u201d<\/p>\n JUUL Labs<\/a>, the top U.S. e-cigarette producer (which has been\u00a0censured by the FDA<\/a>\u00a0for its marketing practices), said in a statement to\u00a0Reuters<\/a>: \u201cThese reports reaffirm the need to keep all tobacco and nicotine products out of the hands of youth through significant regulation on access and enforcement.\u201d<\/p>\n In an exploration of the controversies around vaping,\u00a0Healthline<\/a>\u00a0interviewed Dr. Jordan Tishler, a Massachusetts\u00a0medical cannabis specialist<\/a>. Tishler urged those who choose to vape to use the safest method possible. \u201cNot all vaporizing is the same,\u201d Tishler said.\u00a0\u201cI recommend vaporizing the whole cannabis flower. The little pen-shaped vaporizers that have become very fashionable and use cannabis oil should be avoided.\u201d<\/p>\n Tishler warned: \u201cThe cannabis in those devices is most often thinned with propylene glycol or polyethylene glycol. Neither of these are safe to heat and inhale. There are alternatives for patients who find loading a conventional vaporizer with ground cannabis is too much for them. I\u2019d recommend looking into a pod-based device.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n Pods, unlike vape pens, are reusable, and generally made out of better material \u2014 although this appears to concern what the device itself is made of, rather than the extract or distillate it is filled with.<\/p>\n But the fundamental paradox is this: In states where cannabis prohibition still reigns, herbaceous bud is of course not legally available, which is why some who wish to imbibe turn to cartridges in the first place.<\/p>\n TELL US<\/strong>, have you ever felt sick after using a vape pen from the illicit market?<\/p>\n The post Bogus Vape Cartridges Linked to Outbreak of Pulmonary Problems, Hospitalizations<\/a> appeared first on Cannabis Now<\/a>.<\/p>\n
The federal Centers for Disease Control have opened an investigation into a mysterious wave of severe pulmonary problems across several states over the past weeks \u2014 principally in the Midwest, principally affecting young people and seemingly linked to vaping.\u00a0 The CDC announced its investigation in a\u00a0statement\u00a0Aug. 17. It noted thatContinue Reading<\/a><\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":190,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"false","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[50,943,11790,11557,11791,690,11792,53,11793],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/37725"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/190"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=37725"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/37725\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":37726,"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/37725\/revisions\/37726"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=37725"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=37725"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=37725"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
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\u201cWe know there are certain characteristics in common with these cases, but we have not been able to get to the bottom of exactly what aspect of the vaping habit or product or solvent or oil is causing the injury,\u201d Dr. Emily Chapman, chief medical officer for\u00a0Children\u2019s Minnesota<\/a>, a pediatric health system headquartered in Minneapolis, told\u00a0NBC News<\/a>.<\/p>\nProhibition is Part of the Problem\u00a0<\/h4>\n
Experts Recommend Herbaceous Cannabis\u00a0<\/h4>\n
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\nRead More: Bogus Vape Cartridges Linked to Outbreak of Pulmonary Problems, Hospitalizations<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"