Heavy metals (Cr, Pb, Cd, Ni) in aerosols emitted from electronic cigarettes sold in Malaysia

Abstract

While past studies have detected heavy metals in aerosols emitted from electronic cigarettes (ECIG), they have provided little information detailing the practical implications of the findings to the Malaysian population due to variations between products. The aims of this study were to analyse heavy metals of interest (HMOI) in the aerosols emitted from selected ECIG and to evaluate potential health risks by referring to the permissible daily exposure (PDE) from inhalational medications defined by the United States Pharmacopeia Chapter 232. All four HMOI were detected in aerosols emitted from the selected ECIG in Sarawak. Among the four, Cr was present at the highest median levels (6.86 ng/m³), followed by Ni (0.30 ng/m³), Pb (0.19 ng/m³) and Cd (0.01 ng/m³). Five out of 100 combinations (5%) of ECIG and ECIG liquids were found to emit Cr that exceed the recommended PDE. Future studies examining more heavy metal variants, using a larger sample size and different analytical techniques to compare various ECIGs are recommended.

Keywords:

• Heavy metals
• electronic cigarettes
• aerosol
• Malaysia

Acknowledgment

The authors would like to thank the Director General of Health for permission to publish this paper. We deeply appreciate and acknowledge the inputs, supports and contributions given by the Directors, senior officers and investigators of Sarawak Pharmaceutical Services Division, Department of Chemistry Malaysia (Kuching Branch), and Clinical Research Center of Sarawak General Hospital. We are grateful to Mr Mazlan Ismail from Pharmacy Enforcement Division of Ministry of Health for his technical assistance and providing guidance in legislation-related matters.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Funding

This work was supported by Ministry of Health Malaysia (grant number NMRR-14-217-20234). The sponsor was not involved in the study design, data collection, data analysis, interpretation of data, and the writing of the manuscript.