we always have news at the top of every hour. we have special coverage of tuesday's state of union address, starting at 6:00 pm eastern and the president's speech live at 9 o'clock. thanks for watching. >> hi, i'm lisa fletcher, and you are in the stream. egreats are an unregulated -- e-cigarettes are an unregulated $1.5 billion industry. how safe are they? >> our digital producer is here bringing you the live feed back for the show. there's a lot of good scugs. people are a little --

discussion on this. people are a little surprised that this is unregulated and is available for kids. >> who would have thought e-cigs can create so much debate. you ask whether it harmful. that's a contention: on the flipside: and a question of whether or not they are a gate way to marijuana or regular smoking: >> derek says the same regulations in place should be in place for ecigs. >> e-cigarette sales doubt to a billion and a half dollars.

for many the exploding popularity is a cause for concern. currently unregulated e-cigarettes are blamed for an increase in calls to poison centres. the liquid nicotine cartridges come in many flavours, making them enticing to kids. they are increasingly popular among teams. the number of kids using them nearly doubled. what are the risks associated with e-cigarettes, is it time to regulate them. we are glad to have john, a professor of public interest law. ray storey is the ceo of the tobacco vapour electronic cigarette and dr rogers a toxocologist. welcome everyone to the program. dr rogers, you are not only a toxocologist at children's, you

are the associate medical director of the the kentucky regional poison center. we welcomed a trend to calling poison control centres. when it comes to egrets, what are you seeing. is it disturbing to you. >> we've seen a 6-fold increase in calls compared to last year. >> nationally it's a 3-4 fold increase relating to e-cigarettes, and the concern for us is that these contain aliquid which is easily obtained by small children who break the cigarette. get into the vial that is used to refill them, and contains high concentrations of nicotine producing major symptoms and death. >> what happens if kids play around with this, it is small,

it smells like bubble gum, if they get it on the skin, it's a concern. >> adults get burns from this stuff on the skin. it's probably not life threatening, but it can get a child into an emergency room, a physicians office or hospitalize. >> what is in the cartridges. >> it's five ingredients all approved. all approved for human consumption. >> that means you can drink the cartridge and live. >> the ingredients itself - obviously if you took it in dosage, anything at a toxicity level is determined by the process. as far as the ingredients, they have zero history of harm. in this product when you apply the ingredients, there's no evidence that these will harm

anybody. >> this is contradicted by many doctors in emergency rooms, including the guest, who said the kids are brought in with problems of vomiting. clearly nicotine is a deadly dangerous drug. it is not approved by the f.d.a. they have taken no position on nicotine as a drug and has not regulated e-cigarettes. to say there's no danger to little kids when it's happening almost every day in emergency rooms. i think you have to worry about the credibility. what we can do about this is something that your industry will support. >> you order support making the cartridges and fillers child proof. when i take an aspirin i have to wrestle with a container. that will be reasonable.

i can't see any reason why your industry would disagree that it would be an appropriate warning to keep these away from children and toddlers. >> at the end of the way obviously any products, it needs to stay out of the hands of children and non-adults. let's be clear. that the toxicity level of any product is determined by the dosage. we are trying to manufacture or support an industry that manufactures products for adults that competes with conventional tobacco. >> obviously they are getting in the hands of kids. we have a 300% increase in calls from poison control. no matter what you are trying to do they are getting into the hands of kids. we try to keep aspirin and other drugs out of the hands in kids. we recognise not everywhere is perfect. society decided we'll put child

proof containers. can you oppose childproofing these things to protect the ever-growing number of kids brought into the emergency rooms, who wind up with commas. >> obviously you didn't do any reading up on me as i did with you. i can tell you i am for age verification face to face as well as on the internet. i am the one to push for the product to become a legal tobacco product. >> hold on a second. >> let's get-dr rogers in here for a second. >> part of the problem is access. but if children can get access in the home, they'll get into them. that's where the child proof fortune comes in. to tip the scales, you have to assume that children will get into these, and you have to make

them as safe as you can conceivably make them. this deplate exploded online. whether nicotine is healthy or not. it's substance leading to heart disease without smoke on the flipside. main ingredients - found in food and medicine. if nicotine is present anything or anyone that says it's not addictive says: >> if you sat in the no smoking section of a restaurant and inhaled just the nicotine from the second-hand tobacco smoke, within 30 minutes your risk of a heart attack rose to that of a

smoker. suppose i was sitting where you were and the two of us were puffing away or vaping away and you are inhaling the nicotine from both of us more than you get in the restaurant. your risk of a heart attack it more than that. there is no question that nicotine is an addictive drug. anybody reputable, that's what they'll tell you. the trade association will deny it. aren't there a lot of elements in traditional second-hand smoke that are dangerous including a variety of unknown chemicals not in e-cigarettes. would that make the vaiper safer. >> first of all, we are talking about smoke and vaiper. as the professor talks, nip teen is a second-class.

we are about responsible regulation, age care regulations. we are 100% on board going it logically and responsiblibly. >> we are the first one, again, professor. we pushed for child safety packaging. we pushed for all the things. >> you know, there's one of the things that your organization pushes out there that says egreats are -- egrets are 1400 -- e-cigarettes are 1400 times safer than a normal cigarette. what does that mean? where does it come from? >> you have to look at the nicotine obviously, as we know, is still an addictive substance like caffeine is. however, because we - we are wired that way. we seem to have a fondness of nicotine and caffeine.

if you look at the cigarette, there's 65 different carcinogens, and you compare it to the vapor for the egret, you'll find, that it proves at the end of the day that e-cigarettes are - the vapour of an ecigarette is harmless come paired to other cigarettes. >> 100 times more safe. can i smoke 1400 vapor cigarettes to one regular cigarette and have it be the same firsto logically to me. >> i would think not likely. one is the potential carcinogen that are present in cigarette smoke or in vapour from an e-cigarette. and the other is nick teep.

these are designed to deliver nicotine. we spauk about nicotine, which is what we talk about with children. these are just as more toxic. the form is a liquid flavoured, which will be more attractive to a child than trying to eat a commercial standard cigarette. >> that's okay. we'll talk about what the f.d.a. has or hasn't found. there are concerns with egrets, not only related to small children, but with a hike in ecigarette smoking among middle schoolers and high school users. are some targetting teens. we'll ask ray about that when we come back. some of the implications after the

>> welcome back to "the stream", we are talking about the health and safety of e-cigarettes, and the growing popularity among middle and high school students. they come in flavours like bubble gum and captain crunch. ecigarette lobbying organizations are trying hard to stop the f.d.a. monitoring the products. some lead you to believe that you are deliberately targetting teens, is that true. >> that's not true. we were the first to do verification online and pushed for the program so that we can educate the retailers, making sure they make a right decision when selling to the adults. at the end of the day the product is not targeted towards teens, you may find that the studies out there, the individuals were smoking conventional cigarettes. we are showing that the product is less harmful and prove that the product is less harmful.

at the end of the day we'll try to get those smokers that made the choice to switch to a less harmful product, to purchase that product. >> you think the middle schoolers and high schoolers were already smokers, or are you referring to adults. >> no, data shows that some people are tried or are currently smoking conventional cigarette. >> this sounds like what the tobacco industry used to say. we don't target kids, we never go after them. so the bubble gum flavours is make believe. they say these things are safe. the food and drug administration says "we don't believe it", they found heavy metals, carcinogens are in it. who do you trust. the trade industry, which is making money off selling these

things to kids and others, or do you want to trust all the private organizations. >> you know, professor raises an interesting point. how do you evaluate the rickses. >> it's hard. you get data in any of this area because of lack of regulation. i think it's a paediatrician. my fear is that these are entry of level products. that will lead to nicotine addiction. and probably as kids get older, become adults, some of them will stay with the cigarettes, some will migrate back. >> i'll get community in here. sam disagrees, he says egrets are not regulated and a dangerous rebranding of a product targetting youth and others. on the flipside they say "i love

candy flavour liquid." . >> and another: >> dr rogers, there seems to be a debate in the community about whether ecigs are a gate way to harder smoking or marijuana, or do they help smokers stop smoking. what does the evidence suggest. >> it suggests that if you flavour cigarettes they are more attractive to potential smokers. that's why we got rid of them a long time ago. i think these are undoubtedly going to be a gateway product

and the data suggests that children who start with cigarettes, in this case egrets or traditional have a higher risk of moving on to marijuana, and some percentage of those kids move on to other drugs. >> by the way, that's what all the experts say. that's why we call them candy internets on steroids. remember, kids pretend to puff. now you can be a taken, pretend to puff and give out vapour, and you get a hit on an addictive drug, what could be better. yes, the kids are taking it up, becoming addicted to nicotine and will remain addicted or more likely go on to stronger varieties that is regular cigarettes contributing to the 300 smoking cost to the american public. >> who are you blaming. do you blame the regulatory

structure or the e-cigarette trade association or manufacturers to produce a product you know is less harmful in the data that you discussion. we haven't seen the negative data. you can't have it both ways. you can't talk about negative data, and after that say there's no data available. >> all right. let me answer your question. i'm not against such products. we supported nicotine gum, chewing gum, inhalers. they give people nicotine, and they have proven to the satisfaction of impartial government experts that they are safe. your product refuses to go to the f.d.a. and present its evidence. so all you do is you are spewing various statistics from somewhere, but nobody of any consequence agrees. they had their studies and pet

doctors, and for 20 years they managed to confuse us. cigarettes don't cause cancer. >> they are clinical studies. are you willing to submit the results to the f.d.a. >> plenty of studies done which was published a couple of days ago, that clearly went through every spect of an egret. when the professor taught them >> have you submitted them to the f.d.a. >> i'm the one that went after the f.d.a. to make sure this product was an ilproduct. there's not much you'll tell me about it. >> i was involved in the lawsuit, and you weren't. >> that's interesting you say that, because it was smoking everywhere versus the f.d.a. at the end of the day. i didn't see you in the room. speaking about the f.d.a., before going to a break, speaking about regulation, there'll be a form of regulation

for protection against kids. the moderator said there should be an age limit. and more: >> is this a fad that will fade away. more after the break. . >> i'm a professor of biotechnology and sciences. i'm live on "the stream'.

>> welcome back. we are talking about e-cigarettes, the potential poisoning risk that they pose, the unregulated nature of the product and where they are going, and we asked what the community thought the future would be. >> the future is bright. most don't see it going

anywhere. jeremy says: jessica says: and: >> there's cynicism. >> you only have to look at the activities of the tobacco companies. >> nobody knows the future. we worry because big tobacco is buying them um. that is to my point. which is what is going to happen to regulation, when the big boys play like they are, is regulation more or less likely. whenever the industry is involved, you worry a lot about

what will happen. the yirny is the tobacco industry is in a position to sell to kids, get them hooked and say, "oh, now we have a way to make you quit", maybe it's safe, make it's not. we don't know until the questions are asked to the satisfaction not of the industry but the scientific bodies. >> dr rogers, what happens in the meantime. what are folks to do? >> i think the message we have for folks is if you have e-cigarettes in the home, you have to recognise the facts that they are potentially a lethal toxin for small children and keep them protected and out of reach of small children. that's both the cigarette and the reveil phials if you are refilling your i know

cartridges. >> chicago placed regulations. give it a lisp. >> ron emanuel and alderman will burns say they are banning egrets in public places grose of the children -- places because of the children. the children are far more likely to see me outside a bar smoking a cigarette than inside smoking a fake one. if you arriving me, this has a lot more to do with the fact they get a lot of money for the city on real cigarette taxes that they are not getting for fake cigarette taxes. >> what do you think is the future of regulations for esuggests. >> sith -- esuggests. >> i think regulations will come down hard on certain aspects as we back some of those regulations. age verification is a major part of it. as the professor says, the kids have cigarettes, if they have

age verification and you do the right thing at home... >> you talk about age verification. what difference does it make when there's no restriction on what age child can buy the product. >> compared to what, gun louse >> no, compared to nothing. you talk about age verification as if there's a barrier. the reality is kids are permitted to buy this. i'm wondering what gatekeeper it is. >> 40 different attorney-generals went to washington to implement age verification, i was the first to push for it, back in the day in california. again, we pushed for this to be a legal product to lower the mortality rate because the c d.c. in atlanta, for some that don't know, the c d.c. stated that the product was 1400 times

less harmful. that will reduce conventional tobacco. >> the c d.c. never made that statement. to answer your question, there's nothing preventing hundreds of thousands of dealers selling to a kid that is underaged. there's no legal consequence if they do it. >> that is about as true as you being part of the issue with the f.d.a. when the f.d.a. was sued by smoke and everywhere. >> i was in the case, in the court. >> that's interesting. i must have missed you. that was the case that clearly put the e-cigarette on the market to where it could compete against conventional tobacco, and the children, with any ingredient or product that is based for adults, no different to lemon vodka or orange vodka, it is supposed to be for adults. i have to stop you, because we

are out of time. thank you to all our guests. see you online. >> politicians call an emergency meeting in ukraine. >> this is al jazeera america, live from the headquarters in doha. coming up, a dramatic day in court expected at the hague as two of the most notorious war criminals are due to go face to face. >> the japanese school textbooks causing a storm in south korea. >> and how taking the law into your own hands is