Public Health England Endorses Vaping
Thanks to the release of an official government report today, August 19, 2015, the arguments against vaping as a health risk have been shown to be baseless. The Public Health England (PHE) report states that vaping is “around 95% less harmful than smoking tobacco.” Any attempts at banning, restricting or heavily regulating vaping based on health concerns have been exposed as lies. Local, state or federal agencies that do try to implement restrictions or bans on vaping are doing so solely based on economic reasons.
The report, officially an “expert independent evidence review,” from Public Health England also shot down a number of common misconceptions about vaping, including stating that vaping has the “potential to help smokers quit,” “there is no evidence that e-cigarettes are acting as a route into smoking for children or non-smokers,” and “nearly half the population doesn’t realize e-cigarettes are much less harmful than smoking.”
The release of this report comes as great news to the vaping community and confirms what we have experienced for years, vaping is the most effective means to quit smoking, and the report stated that vaping is the #1 means of quitting smoking in England. The report did raise a concern, namely that increasing numbers of people believe that vaping is as or more harmful than smoking. It stated, “the ongoing negative media campaigns are a plausible explanation for the change in perception.”
Professor Kevin Fenton of PHE said, “The problem is people increasingly think vaping is at least as harmful (as smoking) and this may be keeping millions of smokers from quitting. Local stop smoking services should look to support e-cigarette users in their journey to quitting completely.”
Professor Ann McNeill of King’s College said, “E-cigarettes could be a game changer in public health in particular by reducing the enormous health inequalities caused by smoking.”
Professor Peter Hajek of Queen Mary University stated, “My reading of the evidence is that smokers who switch to vaping remove almost all the risks smoking poses to their health. Smokers differ in their needs and I would advise them not to give up on e-cigarettes if they do not like the first one they try. It may take some experimentation with different products and e-liquids to find the right one.”
The fact that the very first government agency in the world to come out so strongly in support of vaping is from England is not lost on vapers who remember last September’s tirade on BBC radio and Twitter by Professor John Ashton, president of Britain’s Faculty of Public Health. Ashton went on the radio making spurious claims and then the next day was trolling Twitter, berating vapers and comparing them to sexual deviants and referring to one in particular by a derogatory term for a part of the female anatomy. The FPH temporarily suspended Ashton following the two-day rant.
In the U.S. the FDA is accepting comments until August 31 on its proposed rule on nicotine exposure warnings and child-resistant packing for ejuice. You can make comments here. For more details, visit the CASAA website here.
The PHE report also states that vaping, “should not routinely be treated in the same way as smoking. It is not appropriate to prohibit e-cigarette use…as part of smokefree policies.”
Other highlights include, “when used as intended, e-cigarettes pose no risk of nicotine poisoning.” And, “e-cigarettes release negligible levels of nicotine into ambient air with no identified health risks to bystanders.”
Please share this article, especially with your friends who are still using tobacco products, and use the evidence presented in the PHE report to respond to anyone who states that vaping is as deadly as smoking. You can find the PHE report here.
