Atlanta Physician Addresses Georgia Legislature About Vaping

From The Marijuana Report 11.6.19

Georgia State Representative Sharon Cooper, who chairs the Georgia House Health and Human Services Committee, held a hearing yesterday on the vaping crisis. One of the witnesses who testified is Justine Henao, MD, who testified in behalf of both the Atlanta Medical Association and the Georgia Medical Association. She is the mother of three children.

She tells the story of a 17-year-old teen her colleagues treated, who had been “JUULing” for six months. He woke up one morning with a severe pain in his chest. It turned out his left lung had collapsed. Treatment included inserting a tube into his chest to remove air that had leaked from his lung into his chest cavity, pushed against his lung, and collapsed it. He was hospitalized for several days and released, but soon afterwards woke up with a similar pain in his chest. His other lung had collapsed. She said her hospital has treated four collapsed lungs in teens in just the last two months.

Dr. Henao pleaded with the committee to ban flavored e-cigarettes. “We’ve been talking about the latest vaping crisis, but let’s not forget the collapsed lungs, the nicotine addiction, the brain rewiring, exacerbations of asthma increasing all over this nation – and popcorn lung.

Her riveting testimony can be seen in the committee video at minute 51:13.

Watch it here.