Hypothesis: may e-cigarette smoking boost the allergic epidemic?

© The Author(s) 2016. This article is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided you give appropriate credit to the original author(s) and the source, provide a link to the Creative Commons license, and indicate if changes were made. The Creative Commons Public Domain Dedication waiver (http://creativecommons.org/ publicdomain/zero/1.0/) applies to the data made available in this article, unless otherwise stated. Background IgE-associated allergic diseases represent a global health problem increasing in prevalence and severity. An epidemic of IgE-associated allergic diseases has occurred over the past decades globally [1, 2] and many factors driving this epidemic are not clear. The most common diseases (asthma, rhinitis and eczema) are linked, at least partly, to IgE immune response. These diseases are complex multifactorial disorders, with both genetic and environmental components. Reasons explaining the allergy epidemic are not clear. Many inhalants such as air pollution and diesel exhaust particulates are associated with a modulation of the IgE response [3]. On the other hand, tobacco smoking has a minimal effect on the increased prevalence or severity of allergic rhinitis [4]. Any new inhaled compound should be considered a potential adjuvant of the IgE immune response or nonallergic mechanisms leading to a boost in the allergy epidemic. E-cigarettes are largely used to replace conventional cigarette smoking with the intention to reduce known risks for smokers’ health; however, many side effects may still be unknown. Here we focus on the question of whether allergy may be theoretically associated with e-cigarette use.