Alarming Research into Vaping: 10 Health Risks! Lists of Heavy Metals

Alarming Research into Vaping: 10 Health Risks! Lists of Heavy Metals

Vaping or ‘Aerosoling’ is a health risk!

Today just under 1 in 10 Australians between the ages of 18-24 are vaping daily.

What are the health risks?

Which heavy metals are they exposed to?

 

 

 

Transcript

SUMMARY KEYWORDS
HTMA, Toxic Metals, Heavy metals, vapes, vaping, vapours, vapers, nicotine, heavy metals, study, e-cigarettes, aerosol, increase, chart, chemicals, level, significant, metals, lead, copper, nickel, cadmium, arsenic, zinc, pods, inhaled, kids

SPEAKERS
Ann Wine, Ian Tracton

Ian Tracton 00:04
Good morning, good afternoon, everybody, and thanks for joining us today. We’re going to be talking about vaping and heavy metals and its impact on metabolic health.

Ann Wine 00:19
The vaping topic basically started with the newsletter, but it grew and grew. There’s so much new information becoming available all the time. So there’s a lot of research at the moment. Still in certain areas, it’s quite scarce, but when it comes to what’s in the vape, certainly the material is growing.

Ian Tracton 00:48
Look, we probably all thought originally when vaping first became available in the last 10 or 15 years, I think it’s a fairly new thing, it actually seemed like a great alternative to cigarettes and tobacco. But what’s been coming out, particularly in the last three or four, five years, the information is quite scary, and the amount of various toxins. Also the chemicals that people are being exposed to now and we have started to see their impact on health, whether it’s cognitive health or cardiovascular health, cancers and so forth.

Ann Wine 01:30
I think it really hit home with us in mid-last year or basically, we started to see profiles of people in their 20s who were vaping, and one of them, which I’ll show you at the end, was particularly alarming. And really, it’s, it’s necessary that we start asking the vaping question to kids from, you know, nine and 10. Let’s start. What do you think?

Ian Tracton 02:02
We will show you some HTMA (Hair Tissue Mineral Analysis) charts at the end of today’s conversation on vaping, but let’s get into it and give you a bit of background.

Ann Wine 02:14
Okay, let’s start with the type of vapes, because there’s nicotine, okay? And they’re the ones that we know have nicotine in them, and they’re purchased as nicotine vapes. Then there are nicotine-free e-liquids, and which are made with a mixture of solvents, sweeteners and other chemicals and flavourings, and then number 3 other drugs, i.e. cannabis, THC – e-liquids are very popular at the moment.

Ann Wine 02:50
So, with vape devices since the first generation, they’ve they really changed shape, size and styles over the period. The first generation really looked like cigarettes and they were generally disposable. The second generation was rechargeable, they used cartridges and tanks. The third generation, which is now called mods, were larger devices with quite big batteries and refillable tanks and pods, and there were D pods and Z pods. There’s lots of lingo. The 4th generation are smaller, and in fact, they look very similar to a USB. So I think there are many mums and dads out there who will actually not even realize that this is a vaping device. They come in loads of colours, and loads of flavours, and interestingly enough, the pods are generally higher in concentrations of nicotine, even when they say they’re nicotine-free. On the right-hand side, here is just an Australian education fact sheet, and it talks about the different terminology as well.

Vaping Facts

Ann Wine 04:07
So in Australia, we we define certain vapes as therapeutic vapes. And basically, what we’ve heard about lately is the banning of non-therapeutic vapes. Therapeutic vapes are e-cigarettes that have been prescribed by doctors or nurse practitioners, basically to assist in addiction and managing nicotine dependence. They meet TGA requirements, and there’s a limit on flavours, basically menthol and tobacco flavours. The non-therapeutic vapes, which are now illegal, cannot be prescribed. There were no TGA standards to meet, nor any actual requirement at all, and they may have nicotine, or they may not. They’re generally disposable.

Ian Tracton 05:22
Just on this subject, I mean, the non-therapeutic vapes are totally unregulated. What goes into them, how they’re made. You know, again, without having very high standards, there is a problem. And just on the issue, on the topic of therapeutic vapes, I think we’d also need to wonder, are all therapeutic vapes as safe as each other? So I think there’s a lot of issues.

Ann Wine 05:54
You’re jumping ahead. We’re going to get into this in just a little while. Okay, good, in Australia, we’ve had an earlier crackdown that was supposed to add a level of control, and now, as of July 1, there has been a significant crackdown which we will go through towards the end. But either way, we know that vaping numbers are actually surging. So if we look at the stats, there’s a recent Australian school survey. It was actually looked at 30% of secondary students have tried vaping at least once, which probably isn’t a surprise. The surprise is that 13% of 12 to 15-year-olds vaped in the last month, and over 22% of 16-17-year-olds baked in the last month. And then the National Drug Strategy Household Survey, the NDSHS basically, found, there was a significant increase among 14 to 17-year-olds. So they looked at it in 2019 and then in the 22-23 year and they found that basically in the 14 – 17 year olds, there was a jump from under 2% nearly 10% okay, of vapers.

Ann Wine 07:15
And I think the interesting or alarming statistic is that 13.5% of girls had vaped in the past year. 7% of boys and 5.7% of girls in the 14 to 17-year-old age group are vaping daily, compared to just under 2% of boys.

Ian Tracton 07:39
Those stats are quite incredible, and I guess that’s what people, the kids are admitting to, so we would imagine the figures a lot higher.

Ann Wine 07:49
Yeah. So for the 18 to 24-year-olds, we’re looking at 5% in 2019 and in the 22 to 23 years we’re looking at 21% so that is huge, with 1 in 9. nearly 1 in 10 nearly reporting daily vaping. So that’s our 18 to 24 year old, and a lot of them have grown up with it. In comparison, we know it’s not aimed at the oldies, only 1.6% of people in the 60 to 69-year-old category had vaped in the past year.

Ann Wine 08:31
So really, in May 2023 the Queensland Government released a media statement announcing that they had analysed the chemical composition of 17 e-liquid samples that they had purchased just from local shops. So basically, there was a staggering amount of nicotine in some of them. Even though they were supposed to be nicotine-free, a lot of them at very high levels. Other things found in them were obviously chemicals, but then heavy metals like arsenic, zinc, lead, mercury, nickel, chromium, antimony, aluminium, iron, nickel, barium manganese, copper, strontium and vanadium. So you can see there’s basically a cocktail of heavy metals.

Ian Tracton 09:20
And I would have to say that’s exactly what we’ve been starting to find in HTMA (Hair Tissue Mineral Analysis) reports, with vapers.

Ann Wine 09:30
There’s been a significant number of studies over the past five years looking at heavy metal in vapes. There are many variables, definitely different companies, different flavours, different methodologies, like whether it’s a Z-pod, a D-pod or a mod, – they all have different levels, but pretty much all of them put out an unreasonable level of heavy metals, especially when you think it’s our kids taking it.

Ann Wine 10:16
This is in the Australian GP news just recently in April, and basically, it’s that toxic uranium and lead exposure linked to teen vaping. So as teenage vaping rises in Australia, US studies warned that the habit could be exposing users to harmful heavy metals. So it is getting out there. The research basically looked at 1600 teenagers between the ages of 13 and 17. 200 of them were vapors. It was a period from 2018 to 2019 sorry, December 2018 to November 2019. Urine sample analysis revealed lead levels were up to 40% higher in intermittent vapers as compared to occasional vapers. So that’s not even compared to non-vapors. The flavours that they looked at were either mint or menthol, fruit, sweet or tobacco-type ones. And what they found was there was up to 90% higher uranium level in the sweet one as opposed to the menthol or mint. So it shows you that what the younger kids are being exposed to now,

Ian Tracton 11:42
I know many of you are going to ask us the question, where’s that uranium coming from with it? And at the moment, we can’t tell you. We don’t know.

Ann Wine 11:52
Well, it’s possibly coming from the nicotine and it’s coming from, yeah, a few different places, but we are going to go into contaminants in a little while, but basically, the studies authors noted that absorbing these heavy medical heavy metals during the period of development can have harmful effects, citing research that shows increased exposure is linked to cognitive impairment, behavioural disturbances, respiratory complications, cancer and cardiovascular disease in children. So this is from the GP news, and I think it’s really important that they’re starting to accept there is an issue.

It’s great that we’re getting some recognition from the traditional medical fraternity on this, and heavy metals that we’ve been speaking about for a long time.

Ann Wine 12:40
Yeah, so let’s just look at the different issues. And the first one I want to bring up is it’s not vaping, right? They’re not putting vapour out. They’re actually putting aerosol out. So typically, you know, a vape has a battery, a heating element cartridge, and basically it’s heating the liquid, and it produces a fine spray of chemicals that are inhaled into the lung. Studies have looked at what is this aerosol, and they found that vaping indoors produced 150 micrograms per cubic meter, up to 1500 micrograms. Basically, to position what that means, generally, to have a nice environment, we want to be under 12 micrograms, and then there’s little or no risk in the environment from exposure. As the level goes to above 35 micrograms per meter cubed, during a 24-hour period, the air is considered unhealthy and can cause issues for people with existing breathing issues, like asthma. Okay, and we’re talking about 1500 micrograms, so significant pollution from the aerosol. They’ve also looked at the average fine particle. Sorry, they’ve also looked at the ultra-fine particles, which are those under 2.5 and basically these were at 7.2 10 to the third. So 7200 or 62,000, particles per cubic centimeter.

Ann Wine 14:39
So the bottom line is, it is worse than previously thought. It’s so toxic. I mean past studies have shown an association between Ultrafine particles, increased asthma symptoms, and cardiovascular disease markers. And decrease cognitive function. So it’s, it’s not a vape it’s an aerosol, and I think people will be full of particulates. And because these are a lot of, these are nanoparticles, and then they’re so small that they travel deep into our lungs when inhaled, and it’s easily absorbed into the bloodstream. I think the thing is, if we called them aerosols, it wouldn’t sound so nice when we call them vapes. It sounds like it’s just moisture, and you know, nothing else, and it’s clean. And when we call it an aerosol, and you understand the particulates in it. Some of the particulates in there are propylene glycol, vegetable glycerin, nicotine, we’ve got VOC and, of course, the heavy metals we’ve already discussed. So yeah, not vapes, aerosols.

Ann Wine 15:59
When the person vaping breathes out, they’re actually exhaling the same chemicals into the environment. So this is second-hand aerosol or SHA. When this aerosol is deposited on surfaces in the environment, such as furniture, clothing, and kids’ toys, it’s known as third-hand aerosol or THA and other people in the environment, the bystanders will breathe in the second hand and the toxins it contains. And if someone touches the surface that has the THA on them, like kids touching toys that have been exposed, tabletops, yeah, tabletops, you know, even when they’re out and people are walking on the street smoking and they touch a handrail you know, it can be absorbed through their skin.

Ian Tracton 16:52
And because the the chemicals or the particulates are quite fine, or nano the absorption through the skin is actually considerable, or quite an increase in the absorption rate.

Ann Wine 17:03
I just want to touch on some of the chemicals. And you know, we talk a lot about heavy metals, but with this one, I just want to talk about carbonyls are at 10 times the level, and when they break down, some of them will break down into formaldehyde, acetaldehyde, you know, which we know are cancer-causing, additionally, some vape manufacturers add vitamin E acetate to vaping liquids, and especially those that have THC to thicken or dilute them. Well, the first study that we’ve seen that was really great was in 2019, but we know Vitamin E acetate, which is quite sticky, is associated with lung injury, and we’re going to go into that in a minute, but there’s another 2015 study. So this has been going on for a while and inhaling large amounts of propylene glycol and glycerol can actually irritate the airways, and that also points out that levels of these chemicals in e-cigarettes are actually high enough to cause this irritation with just one puff.

Ian Tracton 18:18
I’d imagine there’s a lot of synthetic chemicals in there. This vitamin E is definitely a synthetic vitamin E as well

Ann Wine 18:25
glycol and glycerol, yes. Vapers often call it a “throat hit”, the term describes the tingling, burning sensation that a person can experience as they inhale the vapour, which is caused by heating and inhaling the chemicals in the liquid. Not really great. Another very interesting study was from Anne Marie Rule from John Hopkins University, and she raised concerns with regard to the flavour such as ethyl maltol, which is an artificial sweetener that tastes a bit like cotton candy. They’ve long known that ethyl maltol helps to transport heavy metals into cells. So Rule, basically just put forward a hypothesis that maybe this was increasing the potential toxicity of e-cigarettes, and so they did some research looking at the co-exposure of ethyl maltol and copper and found it actually caused lung epithelial cells to die off. That was a 2021, study if you want to look for it.

Ian Tracton 19:38
Yeah, as you said, keeps getting worse the more you react to this.

Ann Wine 19:42
Yeah, and I just really did want to touch on cannabis vapes, because that is a growing industry. And just understand this a Canadian study from 2022 and I think it’s important to realize that a lot of the vapes are used internationally or globally. So there are no Australian-made vapes as such. Most of them do come in from overseas. And basically they looked at legal vapes versus illegal vapes. You can see here that pretty much whether they were legal or illegal, they had heavy metals. On this chart look at cobalt, chromium, copper, nickel, lead and vanadium.

Ian Tracton 20:25
I just think as soon as there’s an electronic heating element, you’re going to have a problem.

Ann Wine 20:32
Yeah. So where do the contaminants come from? So generally, contaminants, you know that many include heavy metals are coming from the heating coil, the solders and the wick, the atomizer, which is really the heart of the vaping device, heats the liquid to the point of vaporization, which allows the user to then inhale the vapour. So the metals, like nickel, chromium and copper coated with silver are used to make that thin wire that is the heating element of the cigarette, the atom or the vape, the atomizer and the heating coils can also contain aluminium. Chromium is used to make atomizers and heating coils. Copper is used to make atomizers, tin probably comes from the solder joints. Atomizers and heating cores can also contain iron. Nickel found in e-cigarettes, the vapor may originate from the atomizer or the heating coils. Cadmium, lead, nickel and silver are from the heating element. And silicate particles can actually come from fibreglass wicks. So silicate nanoparticles have been found in vapours generated from fibreglass wicks, and the nanoparticle can actually be produced by the heating element or from the pyrolysis of chemicals directly touching the wire surface. So, you know, things like candle and nichrome are used, and they put our chromium and nickel, and so forth. So there’s a whole list of heavy metals that are actually used in the componentry. Studies, where they thought that maybe it was only the metals that were that were causing the heavy metals, actually found that the liquids, as well, contained heavy metals. So yeah, and I suppose it’s not a surprise where we know a lot of them have nicotine in them, and nicotine is full of heavy metals – so loads of studies.

Vaping Health Risks

Ann Wine 22:47
This is a 2020, study, and it looked at cancer and non-cancer risks and basically the presence of metallic structures, including the atomizer, cartomiser or pleomiser, resistance wires, wicking element and battery, combined with cyclic temperature changes within the device, resulted in metals leaching into the liquid before and during aerosol aerosolisation, these researchers reported large variations in metal concentrations of several orders of magnitude, both within brands and across manufacturers. So it’s also important to remember that every time that little device heats up the liquid, some of that heavy metal is leaching in as well.

So it’s not just in the vapour. You know that e-liquid is becoming more and more potent as it heats up and reduces, while the vape is being used. So if we look at the environmental aspect of vaping, it’s where the lung cancer risks are there. It’s a quite interesting chart. Our normal, everyday environmental toxicants, like radiation, asbestos, and pesticides, as you know come from industry. And then we look at vaping, which is putting out, propylene glycol, vegetable glycerin, aldehydes formaldehyde and such, our vitamin E acetate and they overlap with heavy metals like arsenic, copper, cadmium, chromium, lead and nickel. It’s not a shock that as you’ll see it later, we talk about some of the charts that look like miners.

No surprise that there’s a lung cancer risk associated with vaping, and the environmental issue doesn’t stop there. So I just thought I’d touch on this. We know, that vaping, the vapour that’s produced, obviously the particle sizes, and the heavy metals increase air pollution, but also we have to consider the microplastics that are produced from not disposing of the e-pods or the cartridges correctly, because, remember, they’re disposable units. A lot of them are just chucked out, used and thrown away. Then there’s the battery and the metal-coated wires leading to battery acid, and they also obviously are leaching heavy metals, lithium, lead, arsenic, aluminium, mercury, cadmium and bromines. And basically, it creates an increase in environmental toxicants and ends up in the air, water and soil.

Ian Tracton 25:39
It’s just quite incredible how for the last 30 or 40 years, we talk about cleaning up our environment in every way, and we’ve just created this whole new industry that has a whole new set of toxins, not only that we’re inhaling, that we’re throwing into our environment and disposing of. Absolutely that’s ending up in the waterways and into our ground and across the board.

Ann Wine 26:07
And this is a 2023, study. And you know, these are current studies. So if we look at the effects on our kids, this is a really important study. It looks at the effect on reproductive systems. And basically, e-cigarettes or vapes, even when nicotine-free, include endocrine disruptors that disturb hormonal balance and negatively affect the morphology and the function of reproductive organs. And as is true for smoking. There are significant effects on the human reproductive system, and the study looked at the male reproductive system and females I just gave you the summary, but it’s well worth looking if you’re dealing with kids and exposure.

Most of the research is animal models and these studies indicate that the use of vapes disturbs seminiferous epithelium and sperm morphology. Basically, exposure to e-liquid with or without nicotine resulted in a marked decrease in circulating testosterone levels by 50% and 30% respectively, because of a decrease in mRNA and sperm collected from the epidermis quarter revealed a significant decrease in sperm count and viability, and for women, exerted a significant effect on fertility. So the process of implantation, particularly during pregnancy, can lead to various pathologies in the offspring. I mean, there were significant issues and, of course, you know, a lot of people think it’s okay to use the vape while you’re pregnant.

Ian Tracton 28:01
Really?

Ann Wine 28:02
Absolutely. Smoking no – this is vaping.

Ian Tracton 28:06
I can’t imagine any woman wanting to vape when she’s pregnant.

Ann Wine 28:10
It’s really early research. We’re really looking at early research on the effect of vaping on human reproductive organs and it’s really alarming. I think it’s quite shocking, okay. Pulmonary effects. I mean, there’s so many e-cigarettes or vapes that has been associated with increased asthma, wheezing in in young kids, in adolescents that never smoked, increase in bronchitis symptoms straight after baby increased in chronic bronchitis. Symptoms increased biomarkers of airway epithelial injury, sustained so forth. They’re significant issues.

Basically, e-cigarettes or vapes used in never-smokers were significantly associated with developing respiratory diseases and worse, pulmonary-related health outcomes for people once they started vaping so significant long-term issues and damage to the lungs in sorry and cardiovascular effects. We’re not surprised, if you’re breathing in aldehydes and macroline and ultra-fine particles, you’re going to have significant issues.

When looking at the effect on cardiovascular or coronary disease, it caused hypertension, thrombosis, arrhythmias, myocardial dysfunction, and so forth as per the slide. So this is from, also from a study. But you can’t see very well on the slide, but I can fix it. And of course, another public health study looking at Fourth Genrationvaping devices causing an increased risk to immune cells, so lots of really significant health issues do. Lastly – Tooth decay, they found an increased risk of caries in vapers, compared to non-vapers. Okay, so quite significant for young kids.

Ian Tracton 30:12
I just want to touch on this, it’s much worse than tooth decay anyway, it dries out the mouth and can lead to less enamel being produced. So there’s a whole, whole range of issues around Dental including gum disease. Yeah, absolutely.

Ann Wine 30:28
We’ve been talking for years about amalgams, yes, and their slow release and, now these kids are breathing in.

Ian Tracton 30:36
So, the kids don’t know they need to know this!

Ann Wine 30:41
Yes – so in 2019, the CDC, or the Center for Disease Control and Prevention, began to investigate the steep increase in hospitalisations that were linked to vaping products. So the patients basically complained of a host of respiratory symptoms, including shortness of breath, coughing and chest pain, so and the thing that was in common, or that united all these cases, was that they had vaped within the previous three months, and so this this out condition eventually became known as EVALI or e-cigarette or vaping product use associated lung injury.

By February 2020, the CDC had actually recorded over 2800 hospitalizations and 68 deaths from EVALI and a lot of it, they believe, is from the vitamin E acetate, which, as we’ve discussed before, it’s a synthetic form of vitamin E added to THC, containing vague products, and when inhaled, the chemical damages the lands. So it’s that sticky substance, remember they did some studies.

Ian Tracton 31:57
That’s interesting. I didn’t really know about those deaths.

Ann Wine 32:00
Well, they did some studies looking at Vitamin E acetate in lungs, and they found that 48 out of 51 EVALI patients that they looked at across different states in America had Vitamin E acetate in their lung fluid. So, yes, a huge, a huge risk.

Ann Wine 32:27
This is just one little study, but I think it really shows quite clearly that. And basically it’s a case study, and it’s from Spain, and it was doc. It was published in the Environmental Research Journal in January, I think 2023 and looks at one family’s exposure and they were looking at second-hand smoke or second-hand aerosol from E-cigarettes. And the family were a 40-year-old, pregnant mother, a three-year-old child and a 47-year-old father. They lived in a two-bedroom apartment. The father had been vaping daily for eight years, and it was after quitting smoking. Basically, the mother never smoked, okay, but she was exposed to vaping or the e-cigarette aerosol in the home.

So, the researchers collected urine, hair and saliva samples from each family member during the month, during the pregnancy and after the birth, they analysed the nicotine, cancer-causing chemicals, heavy metals and other chemicals, and basically, the father had high levels of nicotine in his urine and saliva. Not surprising. Yes, cancer-causing chemicals were found in his samples as well, and heavy metals like zinc, copper and nickel were also present in very, very high levels. The level of toxic chemicals was higher for the father than for the rest of the family. Okay, in the pregnant mother sample, a low level of nicotine was detected indicating exposure to SHA low levels of toxic chemicals and heavy metals, with the exception of nickel, were found in the samples, but nickel was present at higher levels than in the general population.

There was actually no nicotine found in cord blood, but Chrome, nickel, lead, zinc and other heavy metals were detected in cord blood. So sorry, nicotine was detected in breast milk samples. Okay, and the three-year-old showed exposure pretty much like the mum. It was in hair samples, and in urine, and the chemical levels were actually very similar to the mother.

Ann Wine 34:58
So, new legislation as of July 1, has just passed the TGA amendment to the vaping reforms . What took place and basically what we’re saying is, Australians can only buy their vapes in the pharmacy, and they have to be by prescription. So, this affects all those 1000s of vape shops that are on every corner that we’ve seen grow up

Ian Tracton 35:33
They will probably be on the black market.

Ann Wine 35:36
Well, I mean, I don’t know what’s going to happen. I spent this week searching and as long as I said I was over 18, I could buy any of those vapes. So I don’t know if you remember, but on the first or second screen, there was a fairy floss vape, you know, the little pink one with a cutesy kid packaging that was still available to buy.

Ian Tracton 36:04
I imagine you could just buy them on the internet internationally and have them delivered.

Ann Wine 36:10
Yes, maybe. But that at least has to go through customs and you still may be able to buy them within Australia. Apparently people say that the shops – the vape shops – are refusing to stop selling. So they’re going to know where they’re going to go from here. There might be an amnesty period during this converging onto making the whole thing banned.

Another aspect I find really alarming about this is I went online to understand what the withdrawal symptoms are, or if they withdrawal symptoms from non-nicotine or supposedly non-nicotine vapes. And all over the internet, put out by the government, is a discussion on what you’ll feel when you’re withdrawing. So when you quit smoking or vaping, you will have withdrawal symptoms. These can last from a few days to a few weeks. It’s different for every person and they’re temporary. The first week is the hardest as your body becomes used to having regular nicotine hits. It goes on to other sites talking about how it could cause depression, anxiety, cognitive issues, changes in appetite and so forth. So when we know that nearly 10% of adolescents or young adults are vaping daily, if not higher, and we’re cutting supply in a day – where is the support announced to deal with children, adolescents and young adults with withdrawal issues?

Ian Tracton 37:59
I think it’s great that maybe these non-regulated vapes are not on the market anymore, but something has to be done about helping people deal with the withdrawal side of it.

Ann Wine 38:15
You know, there are a lot of studies that I didn’t include, and they looked at anxiety and depression, and how a lot of vapers had an increase in anxiety. And so if you’re looking at now the anxiety or depression of going vape-free, not being able to access what they previously accessed, I think there are significant issues, – let alone the heavy metals – the arsenic, the mercury, the lead, the cadmium, the effect of the body needing to detox.

So, I think there are significant issues here. And I think what’s really important is if you get nothing else out of today – we need to start asking kids, you know, from nine and 10 up, are you vaping, right? Have you tried vaping? You know? Are you using it irregularly? You know, because the stats are there supporting that there are a lot of kids using it. And when we see cognitive issues and an increase in anxiety and depression, and we know that heavy metals, on their own, can cause these issues – this is what we wanted to show you.

Case Studies

Ann Wine 39:35
We’re just going to, do a few HTMA examples here. So, I’m sharing,

Ian Tracton 39:53
And this is probably a bit of a classic example that you would get with quite a moderate to heavy vaper.

Ann Wine 40:05
Okay, this was the admitted addicted vaper who went to seek assistance. And this was from September last year, and it’s quite alarming. The negative effects, the anxiety, depression, significant depression, all sorts of issues, lung issues. She had palpitations or tachycardia. You know, there were loads of issues. So you can see on the HTMA, that cadmium is .095. And by the way, they weren’t nicotine vapes. As far as she knew, these were just aromatic, but you can see point .095, so she’s three times over the chart with and cadmium. And like we said earlier, if it was a miner, you know, the miner would be put on leave permanently, probably with that level.

Ian Tracton 41:12
Just look at this HTMA chart. There’s the lead. You’ve got arsenic and aluminium pushing up. You’ve got the manganese and the iron. If we look down onto the additional elements, you’re going to see some nickel hiding down there. There’s vanadium in there as well. Tin. There’s stress going on. Sodium and potassium have pushed right up.

Ann Wine 41:35
The metabolic type is a Slow 4. A  29-year-old who’s a slow 4.

Ian Tracton 41:39
And then some of the other subtle pickups here are – look at that sulphur level. You know, big red flag on that low sulphur level as a result. So chances are some of those other metals are very likely higher than what the report’s showing at the moment. And the phosphorus level actually has come quite down. But look at the ratio of imbalances. That’s okay. Let’s have a look at the calcium to potassium, the calcium to magnesium, the sodium to magnesium. The adrenal ratio is really pumping away there. Her thyroid ratio, it’s actually really increased. She’s got slow metabolic type, but she’s got racing adrenals and racing and increased thyroid activity, so the whole autonomic nervous system is just not in sync, and you know, endocrine functions are really struggling.

Then let’s look at those toxic ratios, and you can see straight away, the zinc to cadmium, very low, sulphur to cadmium, very, very low. There’s iron to lead, calcium to lead. They’re all problematic. And there’s some subtleties down there in the lower chart as well, because we’re affecting maybe that strontium could be part of that picture. But, you know, you’ve got low calcium to strontium, her chrome into vanadium. The ratio affecting blood sugar is, is a little bit down there.

Ann Wine 43:14
That selenium and zinc to tin – they’re both suffering.

Ian Tracton 43:19
Oh, that Selenium and zinc to tin is extremely low per sulphur to copper, extremely low. So there’s a lot going on on this report, and with the potassium racing.

Ann Wine 43:31
So you know, this is a very extreme HTMA chart, and really was due to being addicted to vaping. OK, should we move on here? So the next HTMA example basically, we’ve got a 25-year-old female and she’s a Fast 4, and you can see the same thing. Look at the contaminants. We’ve got the lead, the cadmium, arsenic. We’ve got a very high level of lead and a very high level of zinc by manganese with vanadium pushed up. Nickel is pushed up and the calcium is low. So there’s a lot going on in this HTMA chart too. Also note that most of the nutrients are so low.

Ian Tracton 44:20
She’s depleted. She’s really struggling with energy. This particular female is a fast metabolic type. But look at those imbalances. Look at how low that sodium potassium is with her. I mean, this is probably the point that I really wanted to make, is that you can’t predict the impact of vaping on somebody’s metabolism. Yes, we can predict it from the point of view that we’re going to see some lead and cadmium and arsenic and some elevation of some metals. But how it’s affecting their nutrient minerals can’t be predicted.

Ann Wine 44:57
This came in as a vaper because the practitioner actually asked if the patient vaped, it wasn’t something that was forthcoming, it was part of the patient history, so it wasn’t seen as a problem or as a cause for the issues that this person had – which were anxiety, depression and fatigue,

Ian Tracton 45:29
If we have a quick look at the HTMA, you can see the adrenals, and again, many of the reasons she’s come into for, you know her anxiety, fatigue – they’re all listed here on the tendency chart. That ratio balances what you were just showing. I mean, her, her adrenals – look at the sodium-to-magnesium ratio – you hardly see it, it’s that low and the calcium-to-magnesium ratio is terrible. You know, calcium to potassium, zinc to copper, where there’s a lot going on in this HTMA chart, you’ll pick up some of the subtleties in the toxic ratio. So I guess, people ask the question that our practitioner asked – how do we treat the person? Well, obviously, we’re going to treat the pattern that we’re looking at. So, we want to, in this particular case – we want to give some calming nutrients, be able to build that calcium and magnesium, but we still need to support and regulate the adrenals a bit better. This person needs calcium.

Ann Wine 46:43
Also a sedative mineral to try and calm them.

Ian Tracton 46:47
Yes, but we’re still going to be going for some potassium, you know, to build that as well. Also, probably some enzymes, vitamin E, and Selenium are going to come into play. Even though the Selenium is high, we’re going to need that as well.

Ann Wine 47:04
You can see that she’s got a need for copper because look at that copper and zinc. You know, we can see, if we look here, that zinc-to-copper ratio.

Ian Tracton 47:14
Again, this is an example where we’re actually using copper nutritionally to antagonise some of the heavy metals. So people often think copper can be a heavy metal or toxic metal as well, but just as much as we can use zinc to collate cadmium and lead (and sometimes mercury, by the way) we can use copper as well. And this is a classic example where copper is being used nutritionally, and zinc has shot up too high, right?

Ann Wine 47:44
Yes. I mean, there’s loads of zinc in a lot of the vapes. But also, you know, copper is a great calcium synergist, and we really need to get the calcium up. And you can see that lead and cadmium will be interfering with calcium as well. So there are significant problems here. Okay, there are a few other HTMA charts. This is a 34-year-old female you can see.

Ian Tracton 48:13
Well, she’s again, very stressed and exhausted with chronic fatigue, diarrhea, gut issues. She’s been on CBD oil at night. She actually told the practitioner that she vapes to deal with the stress. Well, might have helped for the first few weeks, I don’t know, probably not, but it’s only exacerbating her scenario now, and she’s now become a chronic vaper. And honestly – and many of you know this – I mean, these people that are vaping, some of them vape more than that. They breathe, then they’re going for another puff and another puff, where, with a cigarette, you might limit it to three cigarettes a day. I mean vaping, they just add it in all the time well.

Ann Wine 49:02
We see it because you’re standing in the queue for something, and people are vaping in the queue, or I went, to a restaurant and people are surreptitiously vaping at the table. And you know that’s socially unacceptable with smoking now, and yet it’s socially very acceptable with vaping or ‘aerosoling’.

Ian Tracton 49:24
We see the classic arsenic, lead, aluminium, a bit of cadmium there on the lower HTMA chart, and there’s some tin and vanadium’s pushing up. Not sure if that boron is from the vape. I haven’t seen that in the research, but I don’t know, possibly. But again, its effect on adrenals and neuroendocrine is definitely not helping this particular person at all and her list of recommendations. So we’re going to have to drill down a little bit to see what we can get her to be compliant with.

Ann Wine 50:11
Okay the next HTMA – this is a male – a 23-year-old. It is with the guys as well. It’s not just the girls, but as you can see, his copper and zinc, irons up, molybdenum’s up and Manganese. Look at the heavy metals or toxic elements he has some lead, aluminum, cadmium, arsenic and even some lithium.

Ian Tracton 50:33
And again, you know, it’s funny, we don’t, we didn’t see the elevated iron in the other HTMA reports, but it’s come up here with the iron and the manganese, and look at that calcium level. I mean that calcium levels went right down at the other end of the chart there. And look at that sulphur level. So there’s a hell of a lot.

Ann Wine 50:54
Actually, it was the report that actually triggered the practitioner to ask.

Ian Tracton 50:59
What more might be going on?

Ann Wine 51:03
Also whether the person was a vaper – and that was confirmed. So it’s really interesting that they needed the hair mineral analysis HTMA test to actually know to ask the question. I mean, otherwise, you’re looking at a chart thinking, where could somebody get this, you know. Maybe if they’re an electrician, but even at the age of 23 to have that much and so many issues.

Ian Tracton 51:30
In particular, with the female examples that we gave earlier, you would actually think, that she’s an electrician, she’s a plumber, she’s a carpenter or that she works in the mines.

Ann Wine 51:43
The last example is pretty much the same. A lot of the metals are up. We’ve got vanadium and lithium up. So we are seeing charts. We’re often asked, you know – where the heavy metals are coming from? And I think now we really need to be asking people, especially young folk, whether they’re vaping, and if so, how often.

Ian Tracton 52:12
So the take home of today is the lungs are highly absorptive to all these unwanted metals, both heavy metals or toxic elements and other metals. They absorb a lot of the other unwanted chemicals quite effectively and have a huge impact on body metabolism. Elements that you’re going to be looking for are going to be your aluminium, your lead, your cadmium, arsenic, iron, manganese, chromium, even zinc and so forth, tin and nickel. I don’t know about zirconium, maybe.

Ann Wine 52:53
Zirconium is an alloy. So, you know, we’re talking about cases that are made. Some are plastic, some are alloys.

Ian Tracton 53:01
The reason why they’ve used zirconium is because it’s got a very low thermal conductivity.

Ann Wine 53:09
Well, there’s a lot of heat in that little device.

Ian Tracton 53:14
The bottom line is a hell of a lot worse for you – than drinking your coffee through those aluminium coffee pods, which we don’t recommend anyway. But thank you for joining us today, and I hope we’ve added a little bit to your knowledge, which is what we try and do here every time at InterClinical. We hope to give you a direction on what you’re looking for and an approach to therapy.

Ann Wine 53:43
And do remember, it’s addictive, right? And it causes withdrawal symptoms. So apart from the heavy metal issue and the effect on the biochemistry – it’s the effect on the brain as well.

Ian Tracton 53:59
Again, as if we didn’t have enough problems to deal with, with carcinogens and other things affecting all our health factors today. Now we have a new industry of health-contributing factors being the vaping side of life. Thank you to all our hair tissue mineral analysis practitioners.

Ann Wine 54:15
See you next time. If you want more information, always give us a call or let the office know and they can send you the slides. Thank you and have a great week.