Top doctor's warning to teens about vaping

With vaping becoming more endemic among young Aussies, a top doctor said warnings around using vape pens need to be more targeted.

Some people may mistakenly believe vaping is less harmful than smoking a cigarette, but Today medical expert, Dr Nick Coatsworth said vape pens can be just as dangerous and a lack of data to support this, because of how new the trend is, adds to the danger.

"We know that the products that are likely to cause problems are present in those sort of nicotine delivery devices," he said.

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"No matter what the manufacturers, as soon as you get the heat required to turn those products into vapour, you start getting aclene, aldehydes, they don't sound good because they are also products of cigarette smoke and we know they are known cancer causing carcinogens."

Coatsworth said there needs to be some very targeted messaging out there to teens about vaping and in 10-20 years time when there are sufficient statistics behind these dangers, it will be too late.

"It needs some really simple public health messaging - the only safe thing to put in your lungs is air," he said.

See what else Dr Coatsworth had to say in the video above

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