UK Teen On Life Support Over Vaping-Linked Respiratory Illness

But Public Health England maintains that UK regulated e-cigarettes carry a fraction of the risk of smoked tobacco.

KUALA LUMPUR, Nov 14 – A British teenager was put on life support after critical respiratory complications that doctors attributed to the 19-year-old’s vaping habit.

Ewan Fischer developed a “choking cough” and was having difficulties in breathing before going to hospital, where he was treated for hypersensitivity pneumonitis (HP) – a type of allergic reaction to something breathed in which results in inflammation of the lung tissue.

“I was really struggling to breathe and they rushed me into a side ward and put canulas into me and it went downhill from there,” the teenager from Arnold in Nottingham told the Press Association, cited by the Guardian.

“I ended up in intensive care and needed two forms of life support. I almost died.”

Doctors connected him to an artificial lung in order to pump oxygen into the blood and around his body. It was after this that he started to recover.

Despite linking it to vaping, doctors are not ruling out allergic reactions.

John Dunne, director of the UK Vaping Industry Association (UKVIA), said that it appeared to be more an allergic reaction than the vaping itself that had caused the illness.

“It’s very rare. If you look at what Public Health England (PHE) says about vaping they say it’s about 95 per cent less harmful for you than smoking,” he said.

Rosanna O’Connor, director of drugs, alcohol, tobacco and justice at PHE, said: “We continue to keep the evidence under review, including all safety and health concerns reported to the e-cigarette regulator, the Medicines and Healthcare products Regulatory Agency (MHRA).”

“Our advice remains that while not completely risk free, UK regulated e-cigarettes carry a fraction of the risk of smoked tobacco.

“This view is held by many across the world, including the Royal College of Physicians, Cancer Research UK, the British Medical Association and the National Academy of Sciences in the US.”

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