Hypersensitivity Pneumonitis Case in Nottingham.

No doubt you'll have seen the story regarding a 16 year old boy in Nottingham who is reported to have a case of Hypersensitivity Pneumonitis after vaping. What you may not be aware is this case was actually reported back in 2016, there's a big question hanging over this story as to why it is only been published now and not when it actually happened.

Once again it seems the Tabloids (and even the BBC on this occasion) are happy to unnecessarily spread fear among smokers and Vapers alike. Like the recently misreported cases of serious lung disease and deaths in the United States, this case has no direct link to ecigarette use.

Doctors Nair, Hurley, Gates, Davies, Chen, Todd, Fairclough, Bush, Mahendra Bhatt write about “a previously healthy 16-year-old boy presented to the emergency department with a 7-day history of fever, cough and increasing difficulty breathing despite oral antibiotics and inhaled salbutamol.”

“He had smoked cannabis a year previously but not recently. He had no recent bird or farm animal exposure or any recent travel,” they continue. “Further questioning revealed that he had recently started to use e-cigarettes fairly frequently, using two different liquids, purchased over the counter.”

The teenager has not admitted to using eliquids similar to the ones responsible for the recent outbreak of serious lung disease and deaths in the United States. However it's very important to state that there is no direct link to ecigarette use and it's highly unlikely experts will be able to accurately diagnose exactly what was responsible for this reported case. The British Lung Foundation and the UK Centre for Tobacco and Alcohol Studies believe it's likely a very rare allergic reaction is to blame for the reported case of Hypersensitivity Pneumonitis in the boy from Nottingham in 2016.

It's easy to forget but the UK has some of the strictest Vaping regulations in the world and the cause (Vitamin E Acetate) of almost all of the cases of serious lung disease and deaths in the United States investigated by the CDC, is a banned ingredient in the United Kingdom. Hence why there were zero similar cases in the UK and the ones in the US happened all within a few weeks of each other and in a concentrated area around only 2 or 3 States.

It's also important to remember that the UK industry treats youth access incredibly seriously and fortunately (unlike the United States) Action of Smoking and Health report in 2018 only 0.2% of young people who have never smoked, vape at least weekly.

It seems necessary to reiterate that there are now 3.6 million Vapers in the UK. If this case was not extremely rare there would have been hundreds and hundreds Vapers with the same condition being reported over the last decade. There are no other reported cases and still zero cases that are directly linked to ecigarette use.

The 2 independent studies conducted in the UK still stand, Vaping is at least 95% safer than smoking. This figure is backed by Public Health England and Vaping remains an important harm reduction tool throughout the UK.

I'll end with this, smoking continues to account for almost 200 deaths every single day in England (As reported by Public Health England). Vaping however is yet to cause a single one.

© 2019 JJ Allen.

References and figures from POTV, PHE, BLF and the NHS.