Berry-flavoured vapes may be more dangerous than those without flavour

Berry-flavoured vapes can weaken the lungs’ natural defences, new research suggests, prompting warnings over the types of flavours used for e-cigarettes.

Published in PNAS, the scholars said the study adds to ongoing evidence on how adding flavourings to vaping solutions can increase the associated dangers.

Assistant professor Ajitha Thanabalasuriar, from the Department of Pharmacology & Therapeutics at McGill University, is co-author on the study.

‘We need to be careful about the types of flavours that we’re including in these products,’ she said.

‘They can have detrimental effects. I think that’s really the take-home message, especially some of these vaping products that are marketed for kids — the way they’re sold, the type of containers they are sold in — it’s very colourful, it’s really attractive to children, and this can be a really bad thing for our future.’

The researchers exposed mice to e-cigarette vapour over several days and used a live imaging technique to observe their lung immune cells in real time.

Professor Thanabalasuriar added that more work is needed to pinpoint the specific compounds in berry-flavoured vapes responsible for impairing immune cells and to confirm whether the effects observed in mice also occur in humans.

Ban on single-use vapes

This comes as the government announces disposable vapes will be banned in England and Wales from June next year.

The ban – which will make it illegal to sell single-use vapes – was first announced in January by the previous government but was not brought into force before the general election.

Scotland also confirmed its own ban on the sale of single-use vapes will be pushed back by two months to align with the rest of the UK. Scottish parliament had already passed regulations, originally bringing the ban into force from 1 April 2025.

Last year it was estimated almost five million single-use vapes were either littered or thrown away in general waste each week in the UK. This marks a fourfold increase on the previous year.

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