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VaporLockBox t1_j5v4l8h wrote

Reply to comment by Brasscogs in Canadian scientists exposed mice to vapour from JUUL e-cigarettes and found it caused changes in the animals' pulmonary immune cell composition and altered gene and protein levels in their lungs. by MistWeaver80

>> The puff regime was 1 puff per minute with a 78 ml puff volume, 2.4 s puff duration, with three hours between exposure sessions. These puff topography and usage parameters are consistent with human use patterns.

The median weight of a C57BL/6J mouse is approximately 25 grams. The median weight of an adult human is very roughly 75,000 grams. A 59mg/mL nicotine concentration used as above is approximately 3000 times the human dose when adjusted for body weight. And about 6000 times the human dose when adjusted for total lung capacity. Even without nicotine the volume used is problematic for generating uncontrolled-for differences in both duration and degree of hypoxia.

Lung anatomy and function in mice generates interesting questions as to the appropriate adjustments needed for use in modeling human respiratory systems:

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC184039/

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Brasscogs t1_j5v8l5p wrote

Yeah they said the system was supposed to simulate 3 years worth of vaping for a human but I find that comparison highly dubious. High dose short-term can’t be directly converted to short dose long-term I believe. I don’t work with mice however so correct me if I’m wrong.

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VaporLockBox t1_j5ve7v2 wrote

The roughly 3 years equivalency came from dividing the length of the treatment period by the median lifespan of the mice. 4 weeks / 25 months. So 0.04 x median lifespan of a human (rounding to 80 years) = 3.2 years.

For the sake of argument let’s agree that 4 weeks = 3 years is a good enough mouse-equivalency to define a chronic (long-term) span of time.

The other factors should also have been adjusted to mouse-equivalencies to avoid conducting a study with no relevance to human activity. Especially factors related to lung size and function.

Otherwise all that the study could study was extreme high-dosing and/or hypoxia in mice. With absolutely no application to even extremist human use patterns over any time frame.

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1-trofi-1 t1_j5xpbzx wrote

You are a bit unfair. Most studies start like that and they are careful. This clearly a pilot study to see an effect and get more grants down the line.

They give high dosage to see easily and udoubtly an effect before proceeding with more careful dosaging where the effect might be negible. If you can't see an effect or a very negative effect at a huge dosage then there is no pint continuing.

They are probably at the stage where they need to set up an experimental model, I mean they don't even if their mice ingest properly the fumes. They don't know which would be the appropriate controls.

This is a typical pilot study for me with some results that show a effect with the intention to ask for more funding later now that they have shown;

  1. An effect that needs better understand and further analysis.
  2. that their experimenal model works
  3. that they have prior experience with this type of treatments.

I cannot stress how important the last one is. Setting up a new experimental model with a new type of treatment in mice is very hard. Overcoming the small problems and having it rdy to work is a half the job.

Noone will read this and think, hey ledt do policy changes. They know it, the reader knows it. What they did propably was to set up a model that was sure to work to work out the kinks and get more money later for more detailed studies.

With limited money and the push to publish all the experiments as positive results this is what you get. But everyone knows and no one bases all their policy changes one one paper.

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VaporLockBox t1_j5xt6po wrote

There are still those who think criticism of Wakefield’s work was unfair. He needed to show a significant effect in order to secure more resources. And those resources were needed to conduct more studies which also needed to show significant effects so that more resources could be secured for future studies.

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1-trofi-1 t1_j5xvjuz wrote

Wakefield falsified data, this is fraud completely different thing. You can't compare it with a random study, that has it faults, but is not fraudulent. It would completely different if we knew they changed their numbers.

Also in his case multiple other studies couldn't find an effect, but he insists he was right.

Critisism is different than rejecting the whole idea of the study.The authors are careful and don't make huge claims, this is why the title is general. They push for more studies in the field and this is OK.

Wakefield thinks his studies were correct, despite evidence to the contrary, and he tried to profit from his fraudulent studies. Completely different things. Please don't compare

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VaporLockBox t1_j5zw8as wrote

Wakefield may have falsified data and conclusions but some people believe it was a good thing and any criticism was unfair. Wakefield needed a large effect in order to secure more resources for more studies which needed large effects in order to secure more resources in order to conduct more studies. Since Wakefield’s study was not identical in every aspect to this study some people believe they the two studies cannot be compared. Some people are of the opinion that Wakefield’s study can only be compared to Wakefield’s study and no other study because no other study is identical in every aspect to the Wakefield study. Some people may argue that the conclusions of the Wakefield paper were real and sound and important and wouldn’t effect public policy even though the data behind them was questionable. Who would disagree with the need for Wakefield to raise more money for more studies with a conclusion which some people believe is real and sound and important even though the data behind the conclusion was the result of activities which did not generate data which supported the conclusion.

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1-trofi-1 t1_j5zx0zl wrote

Well he falsified data, he didn't see any real effects stop with strawman arguments.

What he did was fraud period. You can't compare it

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VaporLockBox t1_j5zypk6 wrote

Some people believe that even though the data was fraudulently falsified it wasn’t strawman fraudulent because it allowed for a real effect which was not real but was real so more money could be raised for more studies which also needed fraudulent effects which weren’t fraudulent but were real and not real but were real so that more money could be raised for more studies which can and can’t and can be compared to this study which is not identical to Wakefield’s study in even aspect. You are very much correct in that the data was falsified which led to false conclusions.

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1-trofi-1 t1_j6035ln wrote

OK whatever, some people believe also that the earth is flat.

We don't cater to them our whole policy and existence

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VaporLockBox t1_j605pcr wrote

Exactly. The two studies use data to generate false conclusions but are not comparable because they are not identical in every aspect but both have comparable made up effects which is not real but is real so that more money can be raised to conduct more studies which won’t impact policy because Wakefield’s conclusions only use false data to generate a large enough false conclusions to raise more funds for more studies with false conclusions and shouldn’t be criticized but should be criticized because we shouldn’t cater to them on policy or existence as you correctly point out.

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1-trofi-1 t1_j609nmj wrote

Not exsclty and we agree to disagree. They are not comparable.

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VaporLockBox t1_j60af9r wrote

People can disagree without being disagreeable. Which is in comparison to much discourse which is also not comparable for obviously comparable but not commensurate reasons.

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