New Jersey health officials are at a loss to explain why nine patients have been hospitalized after using vaping products.
The New Jersey Department of Health issued a health alert Friday asking health-care providers to report cases of unexplained lung problems in people using e-cigarettes or other vaping products.
Vaping is the act of stimulating smoking via electric cigarettes, which potentially contain unhealthy substances besides nicotine.
Although the identities of the patients have not been released, most of those afflicted are between the ages of 17 and 35, according to a recent New Jersey Department of Health bulletin.
“The current risk to individuals who use vaping products and develop lung issues as described by the (Centers for Disease Control and Prevention) is currently not known,” reads the dispatch. “However, there are inherent dangers with the use of e-cigarettes and vaping products.”
The alert is also asking physicians to watch out for patients who have severe breathing and lung problems with no known underlying causes that may be linked to vaping.
So far, The CDC claimed it has investigated 94 potential vaping-related cases across the nation.
Three of them are in North Carolina, where the patients needed serious medical treatment.
“(The patients were) needing to be in the intensive care unit on ventilator support,” North Carolina epidemiologist Dr. Zach Moore told Raleigh-Durham TV station WTVD. “These have been pretty severe outcomes.”
