Dallas City Council considers adding vaping to smoke-free ordinance

City of Dallas may update its smoke-free ordinance to include vaping. Today, experts explained to council members why the ordinance needs updating. Fox 4's Lori Brown, live in Dallas. Lori. Cloris, while the effects of breathing a secondhand e-cigarette aerosols is still being studied, today experts told Dallas City Council members that scientists are seeing a link between cancers as well as asthma-like symptoms. I wish you could see what I see. Renee Roberson told Dallas City Council members as a school nurse she's seen the impact of e-cigarettes on kids firsthand. It rewires the kids into something negative so the children vary bright, their focus becomes you know the vaping. Roberson called on Dallas City Council members to treat electronic nicotine delivery systems the same as cigarettes. We have to protect the most vulnerable. Council members were shown data that shows the rise in e-cigarettes wiped out 20 years of progress made combating traditional cigarettes. People weren't getting the same feeling, they weren't getting the same high from e-cigarettes from the nicotine so they're using a nicotine salt and they definitely can be highly addictive which is one of the challenges with e-cigarettes. Even though e-cigarettes don't produce smoke like tobacco cigarettes, they do produce particulates in an aerosol that bystanders inhale. This is not a benign exposure. The American Heart Association, Dallas Fort Worth Hospital Council and Dallas County Medical Society are among the organizations calling on Dallas to ban vaping indoors and at parks like it already does smoking. Dr. Phyllis Shade Afolabi with UT Southwestern explained studies are finding that particulates can impact people's health. Those folks without asthma who have normal healthy lungs also can have asthma-like symptoms when exposed to secondhand vaping. Asthma is a problem with getting air out not in and that's like that wheezing type sound to get air out as well. But data from studies is limited. People aren't gonna really do a whole lot of the studies where they're like exposing people to the PM exposing people to these volatile compounds because they already know that they're volatile. What is more broadly known is the health effect of particle pollution, especially microscopic particles. Carlos Evans, director of the Office of Environmental Quality, says some of the smallest particulates called PM 2.5 are known to be harmful. PM 2.5 causes birth defects and there's an emerging literature every week there's a new article on a new type of cancer. The City Council vote on whether or not to treat vaping the same as smoking will go before the full City Council in a month or two. Clarice Lowery Brown live. Thank you.