HSE issue safety alert as two brands of ‘nicotine-free' vapes found to contain nicotine
In comparison, a single traditional cigarette can contain anywhere from six to 28 mg of nicotine, but the average is around 10-12 mg.
The products involved are:
In a statement, the HSE said that people can return them to the shop where they were bought and retailers have been asked to stop selling them.
Margaret Ruddy, Principal Environmental Health Officer, HSE said: 'We are continuing to identify non-compliant products on the Irish market. These six most recent alerts are for products labelled as containing 'no nicotine', but following laboratory analysis by the State Laboratory we found that they have concentrations as high as 30.0 mg/ml. In response to finding non-compliant and unsafe products on the Irish market, the HSE National Environmental Health Service will continue to exercise its full legal powers to protect public health, this includes product seizure, product destruction and prosecutions.
'Retailers should be checking both the products themselves and their suppliers' details before selling them on to consumers. Otherwise, they may not only be putting the consumer at risk, they may be breaking the law and making it more difficult to trace and seek the recall and withdrawal of dangerous batches of such products.'
As a precautionary measure, the HSE is advising consumers to check the electronic cigarettes they may have, against the products involved in these alerts. If they have any of these products, they should stop using them and return them to the shop where they were purchased. If they have used these products and experienced any ill effects, they should contact their General Practitioner for advice and notify the HSE at info.tpd@hse.ie.
The message to retailers is that if they have any of the products in these alerts they must remove them from sale and contact the HSE at info.tpd@hse.ie providing product and full traceability details. If they have sold or distributed any of the products above, a recall notice must be displayed in a prominent position in your retail premises and on your website and social media.
The HSE said it has contacted distributors and importers of vapes and refill containers known to the HSE and made them aware of this issue and will be following up as required.
The HSE National Environmental Health Service has published advice leaflets for retailers and importers/manufacturers to advise them of their legal obligations. These leaflets are available on the HSE website.
Each year the HSE samples a variety of e-cigarette and refill containers that are for sale on the Irish market. The samples are analysed for nicotine concentration and volume of liquid. Where the HSE establishes that an electronic cigarettes and refill container poses a serious risk to public safety an European Safety Alert notice is initiated. It is the responsibility of the manufacturer, importer, distributor and retailer to ensure that products they sell complies with legislative requirements.
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The Journal
2 hours ago
- The Journal
Asked to think like a paedophile or act suicidal: Workers training Meta's AI in Ireland speak out
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In order to do this, some workers have spent entire shifts pretending to be paedophiles online seeking child sex abuse related information, or suicidal people looking for details on how to kill or hurt themselves. Employees who have worked on a 'Llama Child Sexual Exploitation' team spent full days pretending to be someone seeking out violent or graphic material, including creating the kind of prompts a paedophile might submit. One employee who worked on this team in the last six months said: Every day, 150 times a day, I wrote prompts asking an AI how to kill or hurt myself. 'You cannot imagine what that is like. Eventually – and I really think it would be the same for anyone – those thoughts started to feel normal.' The worker said doing the job led to them self-harming for the first time in their life. Medical documents reviewed by The Journal Investigates confirmed this. Meta has told The Journal Investigates that Covalen employees are not its employees. The company further said that it requires Covalen to provide its employees with training and counselling, including on-site mental health support. Covalen has not responded to any requests for responses or comment from The Journal Investigates . It is understood that Covalen employees have access to some private healthcare, and are offered counselling through a third party company called Zevo Health which offers services from 'mental health professionals (Wellbeing Specialists)'. Psychological impact Covalen workers in Ireland have previously raised concerns about the psychological impact of their work, as well as the conditions of their employment. A 2021 campaign, before AI was part of the picture, led to a meeting with then-Enterprise Minister Leo Varadkar and an employee speaking before an Oireachtas committee. Member of Covalen's content moderation team speaking at a Joint Oireachtas Committee in 2021. Oireachtas TV Oireachtas TV It also included an open letter signed by over 60 content moderators calling on Meta (then known as Facebook) to end its outsourcing practices. The group wanted Meta to become their direct employer and offer them the same conditions and benefits as its other workers. That didn't happen. Steam ran out of the campaign, and the issue slipped back under the radar. Then in December 2021, CPL Resources, Covalen's parent company, was sold to the Japanese group Outsourcing Inc for almost €318 million. AI came along and the nature of work at Covalen changed radically for many of the estimated 500-person workforce that moderates Meta platforms. Advertisement This year, something else happened too: Meta's policy on hate-related content changed. Now, slurs based on someone's 'protective characteristics' are deemed 'safe' according to the new policy followed by moderators. This means that homophobic content that would previously have been removed now has to be marked as safe and left on the platform. Some of the moderators having to carry out these orders are themselves part of the LGBT community. Concerns were raised with Covalen management by these employees, who found the change distressing, but they say that nothing was done. When The Journal Investigates asked Meta about the policy change, the company pointed to a blog by Joel Kaplan, its Chief Global Affairs Officer, which said that Meta is getting rid of 'restrictions on topics like immigration, gender identity and gender'. Meta Founder and CEO Mark Zuckerberg speaking at AI developer conference LlamaCon 2025 in April. Alamy Stock Photo Alamy Stock Photo Workers who spoke to The Journal Investigates have said that not being made fully aware of how difficult the content they will be expected to deal with when they are asked to move onto a new team or project has been a continuous issue at Covalen. 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One worker told us that in the initial phase of a new Llama project they were put under pressure by a manager to write prompts more quickly: They are there at your desk saying, 'Come on, we need you to do this faster, it's meant to take 30 seconds,' and it's like seriously? Do you think this is easy? Pretending to be a paedophile all day?' Another worker told The Journal Investigates that the amount of time employees get for 'wellness breaks' varies depending on what team leader they have. 'One girl was on the content moderation team for child sexual exploitation, and it was suggested to her because she watched the same kind of content every day – namely child sexual exploitation material – she needed less time for wellness breaks, because she should be 'desensitised' to that kind of material by now,' they said. It's understood that Covalen has recently moved from a system of having dedicated teams which dealt only with child sexual abuse or suicide. Sign up The Journal Investigates is dedicated to lifting the lid on how Ireland works. Our newsletter gives you an inside look at how we do this. Sign up here... Sign up .spinner{transform-origin:center;animation:spinner .75s infinite linear}@keyframes spinner{100%{transform:rotate(360deg)}} You are now signed up Previously, the tasks included creating child sexual exploitation and suicide related prompts and reviewing real users interactions with Llama related to these topics exclusively. It now mixes this kind of work into a general 'queue' system that workers on the AI teams engage with. Some workers have since refused to engage with specific types of sensitive material after they came up in their content 'queue' during a shift. Recruitment and unions Covalen currently has three job openings for AI content annotators who speak Polish and Finnish. The job ads say applicants should have experience 'coping with a fast-paced, high-pressure role in a constantly changing business environment,' and that they need to work within the company's values: 'Be Brave, Be Wise, Be Proud and Exceed'. There is no mention of meal provision in the current ads. Employees who spoke to The Journal Investigates claim that some of the former perks of the job, such as access to free meals, have been cut in recent times. According to the workers, their employer Covalen told them it was Meta's decision to revoke access to the staff catering. Meta hasn't commented on that matter. In April, Covalen informed employees that the food provided to them at breakfast, lunch and dinner time would no longer be available. Access to snacks and coffee machines was also revoked. After employees complained about the change, Covalen offered the employees one meal a day for a couple of months but employees say there was no food labelling, or allergen information on the meals, and the food was of poor quality. 'You don't see managers eating those ready meals with no labels on them, that's for sure,' one worker said. Last Friday, the company said these meals would no longer be delivered. Over 100 Covalen employees have now joined the Communications Workers Union (CWU). The toll that dealing with sensitive content and inconsistencies in wellness break length were extra motivating factors for the move. They are also asking for a better rate of pay, as they are currently earning an average of €29,700 per year. 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RTÉ News
3 hours ago
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Irish Independent
3 hours ago
- Irish Independent
Irish investors buy medical centres from France's MNK Partners
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