US health officials are reporting what could be the country’s first death linked to vaping.
The officials said on Friday that an adult patient in Illinois, who contracted a serious lung disease after vaping, had died and that they considered it the first death in the US linked to e-cigarettes. The Illinois Department of Public Health (IDPH) received the report of the death on Thursday, the chief medical officer, Dr Jennifer Layden, said.
The Illinois Department of Public Health issued a statement Friday saying a person who had “recently vaped and was hospitalized with severe respiratory illness” had died. It could be the first death in the U.S. that is related to vaping, the Associated Press reports. The person’s identity and other details surrounding the circumstances of the death have not yet been released.
The health department noted in its statement that reports of people hospitalized with symptoms of respiratory illness after vaping or using e-cigarettes in the state had doubled over the last week, going from 10 cases to a total of 22. The 12 new cases are currently under investigation.
Ileana Arias, a CDC official, said: “Investigators haven’t identified any specific product or compound that is linked to all of the cases.” She added that the patients might be dealing with different illnesses that had similar symptoms.
The news was released just hours before the U.S. Centers for Disease Control (CDC) told the press that the number of potential e-cigarette-related illnesses reported to the agency had increased to 193 as of Thursday. The cases all occurred between June 28 and Aug. 20, and cut across 22 states.
Via The Guardian / Time
