A father has issued a heartfelt warning to other parents after his daughter nearly died from a vaping-related lung collapse.

Mark Blight rushed his 17-year-old daughter, Kyla Blight, to the hospital after receiving a frantic phone call that she had collapsed and turned blue while at a friend’s house.

Kyla, who began vaping at 15, required a five-and-a-half-hour surgery to remove part of her lung and spent two weeks in the hospital before she could return home. Doctors discovered that a small air blister known as a pulmonary bleb had developed on the top of Kyla’s lungs. They believe her excessive vaping caused the bleb to burst, leading to her lung collapsing.

Mark, a full-time carer from Egremont, Cumbria, took to Facebook to raise awareness of his daughter’s life-threatening experience. He urged young people to “throw away vapes” and warned parents of the potential dangers.

“It Was Terrifying”

Mark recounted the harrowing ordeal, stating, “Her lung collapsed due to the hole. They put a drain in her. She’s a little girl who doesn’t like needles. She screamed. She was close to having a cardiac arrest.”

They rushed us into Newcastle, and she had the operation on Tuesday. It was a five-and-a-half-hour operation. She’d had a seizure on the operating table. I was talking to the surgeon, and he was saying about these blebs that can form on the lungs. They think it is the throw-away vapes that burst these blebs and puncture a hole in your lungs. Apparently, it’s a big thing now. He’s done a lot of operations like this.”

Mark described the experience as “horrible to watch,” adding, “I’ve been with her the whole time. It was life-threatening. It really did threaten her life because she was so close to having a cardiac arrest on that Friday. They said she went blue. They thought she’d gone.”

“I Thought They Were Harmless”

Kyla admitted that she began using disposable vapes at 15 after seeing her friends at school doing it and believed it to be harmless. She used to get through a 4,000-puff vape each week, equivalent to 400 cigarettes.

When I was 15, it started becoming a popular thing. All my friends were doing it. I just thought it would be harmless and that I would be fine,” Kyla said.

“Every day I would use the 4,000 puff ones and I would go through them in about a week. I honestly thought they were harmless and wouldn’t do anything to anyone, even though I had seen so many things about it. I just feel like everyone has that same view.”

The experience has since terrified Kyla and opened her eyes to the dangers of using e-cigarettes. “But now I won’t touch them. I wouldn’t go near them. The situation has really scared me out of them. I was terrified. We went in there thinking we were only going to be in there for a few hours but ended up being there for two weeks having surgeries and all this,” she added.

A Father’s Plea

Mark’s plea to parents and young people is clear: “Watching your kid go through this, you’re going to go through what I went through. It’s just not worth it. For kids, they don’t understand until it happens to them. That’s why I wrote on my Facebook. I’m going to have to make young kids aware of this.”

Mark hopes that by sharing Kyla’s story, other families can avoid similar tragedies and that young people will think twice before picking up a vape.

Support and Awareness

For more information on the dangers of vaping and support for those looking to quit, visit NHS Smokefree or call the Smokefree National Helpline at 0300 123 1044.