Tag Archives: Public opinion

What we all know in regards to the US vaping sickness outbreak

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U.S. well being officers proceed to search for patterns within the tons of of significant lung accidents reported in individuals who use digital cigarettes and different vaping gadgets.

A take a look at what we all know to this point in regards to the outbreak and the investigation:

WHO IS GETTING SICK?

The most recent tally is 1,080 confirmed and possible instances in 48 states and one U.S. territory, together with greater than a dozen deaths. Well being officers say 70% of the sufferers have been male. Greater than a 3rd are youthful than 21, with sufferers ranging in age from younger teenagers to 75 years outdated.

WHAT VAPING PRODUCTS ARE INVOLVED?

No single system, ingredient or additive has been recognized. A lot of the sufferers say they vaped merchandise containing THC, the high-producing ingredient in marijuana. Others say they vaped each THC and nicotine. A smaller group report they vaped solely merchandise containing nicotine.

WHAT ARE THE SYMPTOMS?

Sufferers are coming into hospitals with cough, chest ache, shortness of breath, fatigue and vomiting. Imaging checks present lung accidents and docs can’t discover infections or different causes.

HOW SERIOUS ARE THESE ILLNESSES?

Most of the studies contain extreme, life-threatening diseases in beforehand wholesome folks. Many sufferers acquired oxygen. Some wanted to be placed on respiratory machines. Antibiotics did not work, and it is not clear but whether or not steroid medication helped.

“We don’t understand how properly folks will get well from (the lung accidents) and the harm could also be everlasting,” Dr. Anne Schuchat of the Facilities for Illness Management and Prevention stated Thursday.

WHAT ARE OFFICIALS DOING?

Even earlier than the outbreak, colleges have been struggling to crack down on vaping as a result of the gadgets are straightforward for college students to cover. Greater than 1 in four highschool college students reported vaping previously month in the latest authorities survey. Well being officers have warned for years that the recognition of flavored vape merchandise amongst youngsters may end in lifelong tobacco use.

With concern about teen vaping already excessive, the well being disaster spurred some states to cease the sale of flavored e-cigarettes or increase the minimal age for purchasing e-cigarettes to 21. Massachusetts suspended gross sales of all vape merchandise for 4 months, a transfer that’s been challenged in court docket. The White Home introduced plans to ban flavored vape merchandise.

On Thursday, the Federal Commerce Fee ordered Juul and 5 different vaping corporations handy over details about how they market e-cigarettes.

In the meantime, felony investigators from the Meals and Drug Administration are specializing in the availability chain to seek out out what’s making folks sick.

WHAT’S THE LATEST RESEARCH?

It’s not closing proof, however specialists who examined lung tissue from 17 sufferers say the harm seems to be like chemical burns, much like what could be seen in folks uncovered to toxic gases. Dr. Brandon Larsen of Mayo Clinic Arizona says he believes poisonous fumes are inflicting no less than a few of the diseases. The examine was printed Wednesday within the New England Journal of Drugs.

Incomplete lab testing by FDA continues to seek out THC and vitamin E acetate, a thickener, in a few of the liquids examined, however Schuchat cautioned: “There could also be loads of totally different nasty issues in e-cigarettes and vaping merchandise they usually could trigger totally different harms within the lung.”

HOW DO AMERICANS VIEW THE HEALTH DANGERS OF VAPING AND SMOKING?

Individuals imagine nicotine is an even bigger public well being risk than THC, in accordance with a survey by researchers at NORC on the College of Chicago. Practically all adults (90%) imagine smoking cigarettes is dangerous, and 81% imagine vaping nicotine merchandise is dangerous.

Fewer see well being risks in marijuana with 65% saying vaping THC is dangerous and 58 % of adults saying smoking marijuana that comprises THC is dangerous. The nationally consultant survey of greater than 1,000 adults was performed Sept. 19-24.

WHAT DO WE KNOW ABOUT E-CIGARETTE SAFETY?

Well being specialists typically take into account e-cigarettes to be much less dangerous than conventional cigarettes as a result of they do not include all of the cancer-causing byproducts of burning tobacco. And a few nations — together with the UK — have totally embraced vaping as a public well being software to scale back the lethal toll of conventional tobacco.

U.S. well being regulators have typically taken a extra cautious method. Partially, that’s as a result of there may be just about no long-term analysis on the well being results of the vapor produced when e-cigarettes warmth a nicotine answer.

The FDA, which regulates nicotine-vaping merchandise, has set a deadline of subsequent Could for all e-cigarette producers to submit their merchandise for assessment. Underneath FDA guidelines, solely merchandise that characterize a internet profit to public well being can be allowed to stay in the marketplace.

WHAT’S THE BEST ADVICE RIGHT NOW?

Well being officers are urging folks to cease vaping, notably merchandise that include THC, and to get medical care if they’ve bother respiratory or chest ache after vaping.

Schuchat acknowledged a priority about black market merchandise. She stated states that license marijuana dispensaries are taking steps to ensure the merchandise they regulate are secure, however she added: “With all the info I have been seeing, I do not know what’s secure proper now.”

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AP writers Mike Stobbe and Matthew Perrone contributed to this report.

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The Related Press Well being and Science Division receives help from the Howard Hughes Medical Institute’s Division of Science Schooling. The AP is solely accountable for all content material.

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AP-NORC ballot: Trump will get a few of his worst grades on local weather

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President Donald Trump will get a few of his worst marks from the American individuals in the case of his dealing with of local weather change, and majorities consider the planet is warming and help authorities actions that he has generally scoffed at.

Whereas the administration has rolled again rules to chop emissions of heat-trapping carbon dioxide from energy and industrial crops and pushed for extra coal use, extensive shares of People say they need simply the other, based on a brand new ballot from The Related Press-NORC Middle for Public Affairs Analysis.

About two out of three People say firms have a accountability to fight local weather change, and an identical share additionally say it is the job of the U.S. authorities.

However 64% of People say they disapprove of Trump’s insurance policies towards local weather change whereas about half that many say they approve. That 32% approval of his local weather insurance policies is the bottom amongst six subject areas that the ballot requested about, together with immigration (38 and well being care (37%).

Ann Florence, a 70-year-old retiree and self-described unbiased from Jonesborough, Tennessee, stated she faults Trump on local weather change “as a result of he does not consider it is taking place. It’s altering if he would simply take a look at what’s taking place.”

Whereas a majority of Republicans do approve of Trump’s efficiency on local weather change, his marks among the many GOP on the problem are barely decrease in contrast with different points. In the meantime, 7% of Democrats and 29% of independents approve of Trump on local weather change.

Ricky Kendrick, a 30-year-old in Grand Junction, Colorado, stated he’s considering leaving the Republican Social gathering, partly over its denial of local weather change.

“They do not see it as a precedence in any respect,” Kendrick, a {hardware} salesman within the coronary heart of western Colorado’s power belt, complained of the president and his celebration. “There are some (climate) issues taking place that I’ve by no means seen earlier than. … One thing’s altering.”

He was alarmed at Trump’s departure from the Paris local weather accord and desires the U.S. to cut back offshore drilling, finish subsidies for fossil fuels and ramp up these for renewable power.

Whereas the ballot finds about half of People need to lower or get rid of subsidies for fossil fuels, an identical share say subsidies for renewable power ought to be elevated.

However will Trump’s local weather change denial — usually voiced in tweets — matter in 2020?

“Local weather has not traditionally been what individuals vote on, however I believe the tides are altering on that,” stated College of Maryland sociologist Dana Fisher, who research the environmental motion.

She stated her analysis reveals that younger individuals, who do not vote in massive numbers, are activated by local weather change.

Local weather change is changing into extra of a nationwide precedence amongst Democrats however not Republicans, stated Tony Leiserowitz, director of the Yale Program on Local weather Change Communication. It’d make a distinction in an in depth race, he stated.

In accordance with the AP VoteCast survey, 7% of voters within the 2018 midterm election known as the surroundings the highest subject dealing with the nation. Against this, 26% stated well being care was the highest subject, 23% stated immigration and 18% stated the economic system and jobs. Democratic voters have been way more probably than Republican voters to name the surroundings the highest subject, 12% to 2%.

Within the new ballot, roughly three out of 4 People say they consider local weather change is occurring and a big majority of these suppose people are at the least partly responsible. In whole, 47% of all People say they suppose local weather change is occurring and is induced principally or completely by human actions; 20% suppose it is induced about equally by human actions and pure adjustments within the surroundings; and eight% suppose it is taking place however is induced principally or completely by pure adjustments within the surroundings.

There’s a big hole between partisans on the problem. Ninety-two % of Democrats say local weather change is occurring, and practically all of these suppose it is induced at the least equally by human exercise and pure adjustments within the surroundings. Whereas greater than half of Republicans, 56%, say they suppose local weather change is occurring, solely 41% suppose human actions are an element.

People are barely extra prone to favor taxing using carbon-based fuels than to oppose it, 37% to 31%. If that income is was a tax rebate to all People, approval ticks as much as 43%.

About two-thirds of People additionally favor regulating carbon emissions from energy and industrial crops.

Individuals say they’re extra prone to oppose than favor increasing offshore drilling (39% vs. 32, permitting extra use of hydraulic fracking to extract oil and pure gasoline (45% vs. 22%) and constructing new nuclear energy crops (43% vs. 26%).

In contrast with 5 years in the past, People are considerably extra optimistic towards insurance policies targeted on renewable power and considerably extra destructive towards those who extract oil and gasoline. In November 2014, 66% of People favored funding analysis into renewable power sources, whereas practically 80% accomplish that at this time.

“We do not want coal and oil anymore,” stated Brenda Perry, a 77-year-old retired resort government and Democrat dwelling in Plymouth, Massachusetts. “We’ve different methods of doing power.”

Rodney Dell, 65, likes that Trump has resisted what Dell sees as panic in regards to the local weather.

“His route is appropriate,” Dell, a Republican who runs a distribution warehouse, stated of the president. “I believe the local weather insurance policies are overblown rather a lot.”

Nonetheless, Dell, of Irving, Texas, labored in his youth assembling photo voltaic panels and is proud that his native library is 100% powered by renewables. He needs extra subsidies for inexperienced power and fewer offshore drilling.

“If you are able to do one thing to preserve power through the use of the solar and the wind that is there day-after-day, it would be ridiculous to not use them,” he stated.

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The AP-NORC ballot of 1,058 adults was performed Aug. 15-18 utilizing a pattern drawn from NORC’s probability-based AmeriSpeak Panel, which is designed to be consultant of the U.S. inhabitants. The margin of sampling error for all respondents is plus or minus 4.2 share factors. Respondents have been first chosen randomly utilizing address-based sampling strategies and later have been interviewed on-line or by telephone.

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Riccardi reported from Denver.

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On-line:

AP-NORC Middle: http://www.apnorc.org/

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