Teenager rushed to hospital with collapsed lung after vaping the equivalent of 400 cigarettes a week with terrified dad left distraught
A ‘terrified’ father is warning parents about the life-threatening dangers of vaping after his teenage daughter shot a hole in her lung – while smoking the equivalent of 400 cigarettes a week.
Mark Blight rushed Kyla Blight to hospital in the early hours of May 11 after receiving a call saying she had collapsed and turned ‘blue’ while staying with a friend.
After her heart almost stopped beating, the 17-year-old underwent five-and-a-half hours of surgery to remove part of her lung.
A small air sac, known as an alveoli, had developed on the top of Kyla’s lungs and it is thought that her excessive vaping caused it to burst and led to her lungs collapsing.
The student, who started vaping at the age of 15, believed the habit was “harmless” and that he could vape as many as 4,000 puffs a week, which is the nicotine equivalent of 400 cigarettes.
Kyla Blight suffered a collapsed lung after vaping the equivalent of 400 cigarettes
An air blister, known as an alveoli, formed on Kyla’s lung, which later burst, causing the lung to collapse
Kyla has vowed never to touch vapes again after her life-threatening ordeal
Kyla’s dad Mark warns parents about the dangers of disposable vapes after watching his teenage daughter almost die from the side effects
After her surgery, Kyla had to spend another two weeks in the hospital before she could go home.
She now says the ordeal put her off disposable vapes for the rest of her life.
Full-time carer Mark used Facebook to raise awareness of his daughter’s life-threatening experience, urging young people to throw away their vapes because ‘it’s not worth it’.
Father-of-nine Mark, who lives in Egremont, Cumbria, said: “I have been to hell and back with Kyla in the last few weeks. I just attributed it to vaping, they can’t attribute anything other than vaping that caused this.
‘She was at a friend’s house and I got a call at 4am saying she had collapsed and turned blue. I passed in front of her. We took her to the hospital.
‘Her lung collapsed this time because of the hole. They put a drain in her. She’s a little girl who doesn’t like needles. She screamed. She was close to cardiac arrest.
Kyla, 17, believed vapes were harmless when she started using them at age 15
Kyla said disposable vapes became popular with her friends at school, and ‘everyone’ thought they were safe
Kyla ended up smoking the nicotine equivalent of 400 cigarettes a week
‘They rushed us to Newcastle and she had surgery on Tuesday. It was a five and a half hour operation. She had had a seizure on the operating table.
‘I spoke to the surgeon and he talked about these blisters that can form on the lungs. They think it’s the disposable fumes that burst these blisters and poke a hole in your lungs.
‘Apparently it’s a big thing now. He’s done many operations like this.
‘It was terrifying for me. I cried like a baby. It was horrible to see. I’ve been with her the whole time.
‘It was really a threat to her life because she was so close to cardiac arrest that Friday. They said she turned blue. They thought she was gone.”
Mark says the ordeal first started in November 2023 when Kyla was rushed to hospital after he thought she was having a heart attack, but an X-ray showed she had a hole in her lung after a blister formed.
The student was taken to hospital again in February 2024 but was told she had recovered until May 11, when she was hospitalized for two weeks after the bladder burst and caused her lung to collapse.
Mark revealed that despite once catching his daughter using an e-cigarette, he had not realized she had started vaping at the age of 15 and had underestimated the extent to which she did so.
The 61-year-old admitted he had been vaping for 13 years to help him quit cigarettes. However, he is now urging young people to stop using disposable vapes after seeing the dangers firsthand.
Mark said: ‘People underestimate how dangerous they can be. I used them 13 years ago to quit smoking and have never had any problems. Although you think it doesn’t bother you, it may later, after what happened with Kyla. It scares me.
‘There should definitely be a ban for children, especially for disposable children. The chemicals they have in them have not been properly tested. Until the government tests on it, people will do it.
‘The doctor said he sees a lot more of it now than before. He did say that there are many young people with holes in their lungs.
Mark Blight says teenagers are underestimating the dangers of disposable fumes
“I would say to parents, if you see your child doing this, you will experience what I experienced. It’s just not worth it.
‘Children only understand it when it happens to them. That’s why I wrote on my Facebook. I will have to make young children aware of this.’
Kyla admitted that she started using disposable vapes at the age of 15 after seeing her friends doing it at school. She started using it every day, going through 4,000 puffs a week, after thinking it was ‘harmless’.
However, the student revealed the experience has left her ‘terrified’ and opened her eyes to the dangers of using e-cigarettes, which she now ‘doesn’t want to touch’.
Kyla said: ‘It started to become popular when I was fifteen. All my friends did it. I just thought it would be harmless and I would be fine.
‘I used the 4,000 puffs every day and I worked them off in about a week.
‘I honestly thought they were harmless and wouldn’t hurt anyone, even though I’d seen so much about them. I just feel like everyone has the same opinion.
‘But now I don’t touch them anymore. I wouldn’t go near them. The situation really scared me.
‘I was terrified. We went there thinking we would only be there for a few hours, but we ended up staying there for two weeks, with surgeries and everything.”
Everything you need to know about e-cigarettes
How much nicotine is in an e-cigarette?
There are many different brands of e-cigarettes, with different nicotine levels.
The legal amount of nicotine in an e-liquid capacity in the UK is 20 mg/ml, which is equivalent to between 600 and 800 puffs.
The Elf Bar 600, one of the most popular vapes in the UK, is advertised as being available in nicotine strengths of 0mg, 10mg and 20mg.
How many cigarettes are in an e-cigarette?
The Elf Bar 600 contains the equivalent of 48 cigarettes, analysts say.
It delivers 600 puffs before needing to be thrown away, meaning that in theory every 12.5 puffs equals one cigarette.
Experts say that for many e-cigarettes, 100 puffs are equivalent to ten regular cigarettes.
Elf Bars is a brand of e-cigarettes often sold in trendy colors and with kid-friendly names and flavors, such as blue razz lemonade and green gummy bear
Is vaping better for your health than cigarettes?
According to the NHS, vaping products are considered better than cigarettes because users are exposed to fewer toxins and at lower levels.
The health department adds that vaping instead of smoking cigarettes reduces your exposure to toxins that can cause cancer, lung disease and diseases of the heart and circulatory system, such as strokes and heart attacks.
Public Health England, which no longer exists, published an independent expert review in 2015 which concluded that e-cigarettes are around 95 percent less harmful than cigarettes.
However, vaping is not without risk because even though the levels in tobacco products are much higher, e-cigarettes still contain harmful toxins, according to a study by researchers at the Medical University of Silesia in Poland.
And Dr. Onkar Mudhar, a London dentist who posts videos on TikTok, said Elven bars can cause gingivitis, swelling and bleeding.
He said this is because nicotine dries out your mouth and reduces saliva, causing irritation from a buildup of bacteria and food that can’t be washed away.
Nearly 350 hospital admissions were recorded in England in 2022 due to vaping, which are believed to be mainly due to respiratory problems such as shortness of breath, chest pain, pneumonia and, in severe cases, respiratory failure.
