Smoking vs Vaping

Culturally smoking aromatic herbs goes back hundreds of years and millions of people have either lit a pre-rolled cigarette, bong, or pipe packed with their favorite herb. Vaping has only been around for the last couple of decades when in 1993 the first bulky vaporizer was launched on the market.

Since the early years of vaping has developed into a multi-billion dollar industry worldwide and is worth $22.6bn ( BBC 2018 ). An interesting fact to point out is that only 5 years ago the entire market was worth just over $4 billion dollars. One could debate that this increase in value is also due to the uptake in aromatic herbs and supplemental industries .  One must realize through research that has been published is that vaping is a far more efficient and effective way to deliver herbal benefits to our bodies than smoking itself and leads to harm reduction.

Smoking and Combustion

Smoking any herb can lead to the production of tar or other harmful by-products that have been proven to cause health problems and potentially cause cancer. The most obvious reason to crossover from smoking to vaping herbs is usually for health reasons, the traditional use of smoking herbs through the variety of paraphernalia available will always exist.

Preparing a pre-rolled herbal cigarette takes patience and skill and the only requirements are aromatic herbs, a paper, and a lighter. Rolling papers are available worldwide and are probably still the most popular way to ingest herbs through smoking worldwide. Smoking pipes are also a very old and traditional way of consuming tobacco and other herbs. 

Vaping Herbs

Vaping is a modern alternative to smoking and comes with many health benefits. Saying vaping is better subjective and can lead to many heated debates. However, it is generally recognized by top scientists that the process of vaping is at least 95% safer than smoking itself. Vaporization is also the recommended way to administer medicinal benefits of certain herbs as its fairly healthy and provides almost immediate effects.

“ Vaporization is the process whereby dry herb or concentrate is heated to a precisely set temperature that heats to the herb into a vapor before it combusts. The vaporizer produces a stream of vapor that is inhaled through an attached mouthpiece of vapor bag “ .

Vaping Pros

1. Vaping produces much more pronounced flavors and does not leave your mouth feeling dirty and dry. The abundant flavors are tasted more distinctly as the herbs do not burn like when using combustion methods.

2. Vaping is discreet as there are no real pungent aroma’s floating around, especially when vaping at lower temperatures.

3. Controlling your vaping temperature is one of the most advanced benefits of vaping. It's reported that the different terpene compounds can activate at different temperatures. So using a vaporizer to control the temperatures throughout your session using the preset or adjustable heat settings can help you puff crystal clear vapor filled with flavor.

4. Current research reports that vaping is far healthier than smoking. Although there is not much research specifically for certain herbs in particular and vaping a lot has been reviewed in vaping nicotine and tobacco. It does not require an open flame and is usually cooled/filtered before reaching the mouthpiece and finally your lungs.

5. High bioavailability is really what vaping excels at and is by far the most efficient and effective way to administer certain herbs. With between 50% through to 80%, bioavailability when vaping one realizes why it's a no brainer to switch to aromatic vaping.

Whether you vape or smoke cannabis, either way, will get you ripped. But for health-conscious cannabis consumers who want the best bang for their buck vaping is definitely the healthier choice. 

References:

Global Vapor Market BBC 2018 - https://www.bbc.com/news/business-44295336

95% Safer - https://www.rcplondon.ac.uk/projects/outputs/nicotine-without-smoke-tobacco-harm-reduction-0