The E-cigarette (also known as the electronic cigarette and electric cigarette) is the healthier alternative to the traditional cigarette.
Mad as it sounds, it literally allows you to smoke without smoking. Rather than toxic smoke, you breathe in vapourised nicotine.
Since it does not contain any tobacco, you are free to smoke it anywhere you want, smoking ban or not!
Are electronic cigarettes actually like smoking?
As someone who used to smoke tobacco cigarettes, I can probably give you a better answer than most people. Electronic cigarettes taste slightly different than normal cigarettes but they have many more benefits:
- Not banned under the smoking ban
- Save more than R40000 per year
- Instant nicotine hit - 10x faster than gum or patches
- No Tar
- No Flame - zero chance of burning the sofa (or house)
- No Toxic Carcinogens causing lung cancer
- No Unpleasant Odours - tobacco smoke "clings" to clothes
- No Nasty Passive Smoking Effects
- No more Tobacco cravings!
How Electronic cigarettes work
A group of dangerous DNA-damaging chemicals which set cells on the road to becoming tumors.
Carbon Monoxide (CO) (Car Exhaust Fumes)
An odourless, tasteless and poisonous gas, rapidly fatal in large amounts - it's the same gas that comes out of car exhausts and is the main gas in cigarette smoke and formed when the cigarette is lit.
Lead (Paint)
A dense metal with many industrial uses such as paint. Highly toxic, it stunts your growth, makes you vomit and damages your brain. Others you may recognize are :
Arsenic (rat poison), Hydrogen Cyanide (gas chamber poison)
In 2008, toxological tests were performed on electronic cigarettes and they were found to be much less harmful than thetobacco cigarettes. Further scientific tests in 2009 have shown them to be safe.
Electronic cigarettes are rechargeable and refillable so you'll save a fortune in the long run.
You can use the electronic cigarettes to smoke in areas with a smoking ban.
There is no flame, no tobacco and no nasty carcinogens so you can smoke without harming others around you, and places where smoking is banned.