Jordan North: The Truth About Vaping | Preview (BBC Three)

Jordan North sets out to decide, once and for all, if it's time he quit vaping.

The number of young people vaping has skyrocketed in recent years.

Annual sales in the UK are now thought to be £1.7 billion. As a vaper himself, something he took up to help reduce the number of cigarettes he smokes, Jordan is aware of the increasing popularity of the product, but also the steady stream of negative news reports about them in recent months.

Once simply marketed as a safer alternative to cigarettes for smokers, vapes can now be bought in hundreds of different shapes, sizes, colours and flavours, and are available in shops on most high streets.

But many of those who now use them have never smoked, and there is increasing concern about the number of young people vaping and getting hooked to nicotine. That has led to the government announcing they intend to ban disposable vapes from being sold in the UK.

So Jordan, like many vapers, is confused. Is vaping bad for you or not? If so, how bad? What’s even inside them, and how do they work? Are they all the same, or are some more harmful than others? Do we know what the long-term impact of vaping has on our health? To help him decide whether it’s time he packed in the vapes, Jordan tries to answer these questions.

He meets young vapers similarly confused about the impact of vaping on their health, and whether some vapes are more dangerous than others. He also visits his old university in Sunderland to find out how vapes work, and exactly what he's breathing into his lungs.

He learns that some vapes are illegal to sell in the UK, but appear readily available on the high street anyway. He finds out that some of these illegal vapes have toxic chemicals in them that could be harming users.

Jordan joins Newcastle Trading Standards as they conduct raids on shops selling the illegal products in the city, and he’s shocked by how many they seize. Trying to find out where these illegal vapes come into the country from isn’t easy, and no one can guarantee they have been manufactured in the hygienic conditions we might expect products to be made in the UK.

To try and find out what effects vaping might be having on our bodies, Jordan heads to Manchester to meet the scientist behind one of the first long term studies into the impact of vapes on our cardiovascular system. He also meets Jemma, a young woman the same age as him, who believes that vaping for the last ten years has had serious consequences on her health.

After all he’s learned, will Jordan continue to use vapes to cut back on cigarettes? Or will he decide that doing so would be detrimental to his health?

Airs Wednesday 20th March at 9pm on BBC Three.