First, let me be absolutely, 110% crystal fucking clear. I do not care which method of cessation you choose. I do not care if you are smoke free through one method or another. I do not care if you smoke. I do not care if you vape. Whatever choice you make is yours and yours alone.
I vape, and I do encourage others to do so if I feel they want to. I do not preach.
I do like it when someone poses an intriguing question on Twitter (or anywhere for that matter) that gets the ol’ grey matter churning. Not only does it make me think, it also makes me consider the implications of my own thinking - which is largely based in personal experience and opinion (on particular subjects), with some foundation in fact.
This question, posted by Gillian really got me thinking.
General Q: Where on hypothetical scale of reducing smoking rates wld you rate smoking cessation (by means that include a switch to vaping)?
New EU rules on nicotine strength not a problem for most vapers is the headline of a pretty dire press release from ASH where, once again, they show that they’ve never really been the ‘vapers friend’. With an increasing number of smokers switching to vaping - estimated to be around 2.8 million in 2016 - ASH reckons that the Tobacco Products Directive “need not cause problems for most vapers”.
How on earth do they figure that the TPD “need not cause problems” ? Despite regular discussions with members of the New Nicotine Alliance and the increasing number of public health experts (actual experts mind) in the fields of smoking cessation, respiratory medicine, cancer research and many more - ASH have today announced that they simply do not care about vapers, and in particular a “small” group - roughly 9%, which when stated like that doesn’t mean much, how does 252,000 sound? - use e-liquid that falls foul of the TPD rules.
We had some forewarning of this dropping in the Medical Journal of Australia and frankly I wasn’t at all surprised by the authors of the opinion piece. Rest assured it is an opinion piece there is zero new evidence being bought forward. You could almost call it a review, if you are feeling incredibly generous. But I’m long past feeling generous to the three authors. We all know who they are. The three biggest dunderheaded buffoons that claim to be “experts” in the field.
Yes, I know. Another post on rules and stuff. Sorry about that, but I’ve been doing my usual reading and thinking. I also watched Brexit: The Movie where I discovered a few things I hadn’t known previously - none of which made any kind of difference to how I’m going to be voting, but they were interesting nevertheless.
The thing is, and this is from Brexit: The Movie, post-war Britain was a shambles. Post-war Germany not so much. The difference? Regulation. Britain had rules for a lot of things, while Germany did the exact opposite. Interesting things happened, not least of which was the British economy suffered greatly while Germany prospered. Startling. So what does this have to do with this post?
As we know, the revised tobacco products directive enters into force this month, and while many held out hope that it would be overturned by the Article 20 Legal Challenge (among other challenges) there has been a distinct lack of impact analysis of the Directive.
Thanks to Lorien Jollye for bringing this to my attention from ASH. The trouble with the ASH analysis is there is so much wrong with it.
It doesn’t take much to spark some errant thinking and lengthy discussions. In this instance it was the release of the final quarter statistics of 2015 from the Smoking Toolkit Study which is of course performed by Professor Robert West. This survey is used, along with other evidence, to inform those that need to know how many folks are smoking, whether or not they quit smoking and how they quit.
If you are a regular Twitter or Facebook user you would have come across the latest shenanigans from the Chicago Department of Health that was launched amid much fanfare by none other than the Mayor himself. The VapingTruth campaign designed to increase youth awareness.
So what do we have here then? A “public education campaign” to increase youth awareness (The Children™) on the public health risks of e-cigarettes. Oh there’s a surprise. An education campaign to increase awareness on the “risks” of e-cigs.
There is an unfortunate conflict in the realms of public health, tobacco control and the vaping community. All sides effectively want the same thing, to an extent or so they say. Public health would like the general public to be as healthy as possible, and where necessary follow the rules they think are best for all of us. Tobacco control are so ingrained in their “fight” against ‘Big Tobacco’ that anything that vaguely resembles tobacco or smoking must be stopped at any cost. While us vapers just really want to be left alone to enjoy our choice.
As the title says, this is a guest post written by Shannon Sparkles with some input from me, however the bulk of what follows originates from Shannon.
I’m really sad that I feel the need to write this, but it needs to be done.
When the team behind “A Billion Lives” posted the film’s new teaser Friday morning, I was elated. I was finally able to get a glimpse into the work that is sure to change the world.