These Vape Carts Can Kill You
Vape carts are everywhere these days, but did you know that they’re responsible for at least 12 deaths in the United States? If you get the wrong cart, you could be putting yourself at serious risk, and I’m about to show you exactly why.
I’ve worked in the cannabis industry for nearly a decade, and I’ve seen a lot of cool products come and go, but vape carts? They’re hands down the most dangerous. In this article, I’ll break down the three big reasons you need to be extra careful with vape carts - whether they’re from the black market or a legal dispensary.
It’s Not Just Black Market Vapes
You can find vape carts anywhere: gas stations, head shops, flea markets, shady websites - everybody is selling carts now. They’re cheap and convenient, but they might just be the most dangerous way to consume cannabis.
It’s easy to think, "If I’m buying from a licensed brand, I’m safe." But that's not always the case. In a recent investigation by the LA Times, they found that even big brands like Stiiizy were selling vapes with insane levels of pesticides.
One Stiiizy vape was found to have 60x the amount of pesticides allowed in cigarettes, and this particular chemical (Pymetrozine) isn’t even supposed to be used on cannabis at all.
If huge, licensed brands can get away with this, just imagine what’s lurking in black market carts.
So, what makes vape carts so much more dangerous than other cannabis products? It comes down to 3 main reasons that, when combined, create the perfect storm for potential disaster.
LA Times Exposed Backpack Boys, Stiiizy, and more
The biggest brands in California were selling vapes that had INSANE levels of pesticides.
BB, Stiiizy, West Coast Cure, Flavorade, Dime Industries and many more all failed pesticide testing.
Concentrating the Poison
When cannabis is made into concentrates, like the oils used in vape carts, you’re not just extracting THC and terpenes. If there are pesticides or other harmful chemicals on the plant, those get concentrated too.
Think of it this way: If you have a glass of water with a tiny bit of dirt in it, you might not notice when you drink the water.
But if that same amount of dirt was in a small shot glass of water, all the dirt will be much more concentrated. This water would be obviously dirty, and there is no way you would drink it. The same thing happens with cannabis concentrates.
This can lead to some really dangerous results - like CYANIDE POISONING.
Yep, cyanide. The same deadly chemical used in warfare could be in your vape cart, and it all starts with a pesticide called myclobutanil.
Myclobutanil is a fungicide that turns into hydrogen cyanide when heated. In a 2019 investigation, NBC News tested some black market vape carts and found that all 10 of the vapes they tested were positive for myclobutanil.
So, if you’ve hit one of these contaminated carts, you could be inhaling hydrogen cyanide straight into your lungs. And it’s not just the black market—you’d be surprised at how often this happens in legal products too.
Hydrogen Cyanide Vapes
Hydrogen cyanide in vapes is highly toxic and can cause serious health issues, including respiratory failure, neurological damage, and even death when inhaled.
Additives: More Than Just Cannabis
One of the scariest things about vape carts is that people often cut the cannabis oil with cheap fillers to make more money. This can go terribly wrong, as we saw in 2019 with the infamous Vitamin E acetate crisis.
Back then, black market carts tainted with Vitamin E acetate killed 12 people and sent over 800 others to the hospital across 46 states.
While the use of Vitamin E acetate has decreased since the vaping crisis, that doesn’t mean black market vapes are safe. Unregulated carts are often filled with harmful additives and flavorings. Many of these substances might be safe in food or cosmetics, but when heated and inhaled, they can become dangerous.
It is still very common for people to cut or dilute the carts they make. Sometimes this is done to make more carts with less actual cannabis concentrates (and therefor make more money) - but this is also done to add flavorings to cheap distillate or other low quality concentrates to mask their flavor and make them taste better (also to make more money).
You never know what someone may have used to cut or flavor their carts, and since it is really easy for anyone to get fake branded carts and packaging - there are many bootleg carts that look exactly like the real thing from a dispensary.
Everyone claims the carts they are selling on the street originally came from a legit dispensary, but this is almost always a lie. And even though dispensaries are far from perfect, at least they have some testing and oversight. But it still gets worse.
Looks Can Be Very Deceiving
It is very easy to find vape packaging, fake barcode stickers, and all kinds of other things that make bootleg products look legit.
If you didn’t get it from a dispensary yourself, don’t trust that it actually came from one at all.
The vape cart Itself Could Be Poisoning You
The actual hardware used in cheap vape carts can also pose serious risks. These carts, especially black market ones, often use low-quality materials that can leach harmful metals into the oil inside.
According to a study presented at the American Chemical Society’s 2024 meeting, some unregulated vape carts contained 100 times more lead than their regulated counterparts. Even before they were used, these carts were leaching out dangerous metals into the oil.
Some of these carts (lots of them actually) are made with really cheap recycled materials and often contain metals that you do not want in your vape carts. And since the oversight on product quality is so low, even vapes from the same production batch can all have widely different levels of different dangerous heavy metals.
When you vape these metals, they can cause serious damage to your health. Lead can cause neurological issues, nickel can lead to lung irritation and allergies, and chromium is a known carcinogen that can cause cancer when inhaled.
So, with vape carts, you’re not just risking exposure to concentrated pesticides and harmful additives - you could also be inhaling toxic metals like lead, directly from the vape cart itself, every time you take a puff.
A New, Deadly Risk
Black market flower has been around forever, and while it’s not tested either, it’s nowhere near as dangerous as black market vape carts. Vape carts pose risks we’ve never seen before with traditional cannabis products.
I spoke to Elliot Lewis, the CEO of Catalyst Cannabis, who has seen firsthand how dangerous the black market can be. He said, “The BM (black market) remains a dumping ground for pesticides. Super dangerous.”
Even if you buy from a licensed dispensary, there are no guarantees. But buying completely unregulated vape carts is a gamble you definitely don’t want to take.
What Can You Do?
The solution here is pretty simple: Don’t trust any cart you didn’t buy yourself from a licensed dispensary. And even when buying from legal sources, it’s a good idea to stay informed about recalls and potential issues.
That’s one reason I have the High-Alerts email list for things just like this. I send out updates on sketchy products and recalls in the cannabis industry, so if you want to stay updated, make sure to join the list. It’s free, and it might just save you from buying something dangerous.
Check out this article to learn how Backpack Boys, Stiiizy, West Coast Cure and many more brands were busted for selling horribly tainted vape carts.
