Hospitalizations from vaping have slowed significantly since the fall, when the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention officially linked vitamin E acetate, a vaping additive used to dilute nicotine and marijuana oils, to the vast majority of the illnesses reported. Although most of those cases stemmed from black market products, vaping liquid sold at regulated marijuana dispensaries has also been connected to several illnesses, with some THC vaping oils sold by dispensaries testing positive for vitamin E.

According to one cannabis laboratory, though, vitamin E acetate is a naturally occurring substance in virtually all plant products we use, which is why vaping oil manufacturers that don’t add the substance to their products have seen it show up in their test results. To learn more about naturally occurring vitamin E, we caught up with Frank Taylor, co-founder of cannabis testing facility AgriScience Labs.

What exactly is vitamin E acetate, and why is it added to vaping cartridges?

Frank Traylor: Vitamin E is used on skin, and it’s considered to be safe [for that]. So was vitamin E acetate. The illegal vape cartridges, though, they’re so thin. If it’s thin, vape oils are considered of lower quality, so people would use it as a thickener to make these cartridges look better than they were. In tobacco and THC cartridges, doctors started seeing lung illnesses, and the common thread was vaping. Measurement from the lungs of virtually every one of these patients showed vitamin E. [Read More @ Westword]