News Review 30th August
This is the week that was….
The week was dominated with reaction to the previous week’s PHE (Public Health England) announcement over a 111 page Review, which was extensively reported upon Worldwide. The Daily reactions will be charted culminating in Friday’s shoddy Lancet journal Editorial which tried and spectacularly failed to discredit the groundbreaking and excellent Review.
Monday 24th August
This article is one of two featuring the excellent Jacob Sullum http://reason.com/blog/2015/08/21/british-public-health-officials-unlike-o that neatly and accurately summarises the differences in the US and the UK in Public Health approahes to Vaping, featuring the PHE report .
Dr Attila Danko (also NNA Aus) created quite a stir in Australia over the weekend and Monday with many news reports,radio and TV discussions ensued after his call for the legalising of nicotine use in Australia . To see how passionate and persuasive Attila can be his recent Warsaw speech should be viewed https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2dOD0N_k-Ws
Dave Dorn (VTTV, NNA UK) commenced a Change petition calling on the UK Government via Jane Ellison to withdraw Article 20 from the TPD implementation in the UK https://www.change.org/p/uk-department-of-health-jane-ellison-uk-government-should-refuse-to-implement-article-20-of-the-tpd-in-light-of-phe-report#petition-letter
This of course does not distract from the Totally Wicked Legal Challenge to Article 20 http://article20legalchallenge.com/ where support has reached ~43,700 signatures
Tuesday 25th August
Two summaries highlighted the positive messages from the PHE announcement
from Derek Yach (who established the WHO FCTC) http://www.globalhealthnow.org/news/why-an-anti-smoking-crusader-would-embrace-e-cigarettes
ECITA http://www.ecita.org.uk/ecita-blog/highlights-public-health-england%E2%80%99s-evidence-update
This contrasts markedly with the WHO see http://www.who.int/tobacco/about/staff/bettcher/en/
who was featured here in this awful article, demonstrating they have a considerable way to travel before they are remotely supportive. http://www.interaksyon.com/article/116523/who-recommends-regulation-of-tobacco-company-owned-e-cigarette-industry
Bad news from California today – no news article linked – but bills passed in committee stages to class e-cigs similar to tobacco products
Wednesday 26th August
3 Standout articles or entries
Dick Puddlecote’s entry http://dickpuddlecote.blogspot.co.uk/2015/08/drafting-tpd2-consultation-response.html more on this topic later
http://www.nwemail.co.uk/News/Barrow/Cumbria-doctor-says-e-cigs-could-help-quitting-smoking-cdec7cc2-4ca4-4392-8043-dfe46b911331-ds – this seemingly innocuous report hopefully is the start of the revolution following the PHE review
http://www.nationalreview.com/corner/423119/new-york-times-still-denying-vapings-benefits-andrew-stuttaford An excellent put down of the New York Times Editorial that belittled the PHE review
Thursday 27th August
Portugal joined Spain,Finland,Poland in announcing extreme interpretations of the TPD today.
The chosen articles are these
http://www.hertfordshiremercury.co.uk/Council-support-e-cig-report/story-27686172-detail/story.html Similar to the Cumbrian story earlier in the week and demonstrating the ripple effect of pragmatism is beginning to happen.
http://www.forbes.com/sites/jacobsullum/2015/08/27/wacky-british-idea-why-not-tell-the-truth-about-e-cigarettes/ persuasive reasoning from Jacob Sullum
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D25HhHvfuMU&feature=youtu.be A good Deborah Arnott interview on mainstream TV
https://www.ecigarettedirect.co.uk/ashtray-blog/2015/08/10-outrageous-e-cig-exaggerations-that-keep-smokers-smoking.html An outstanding blog by Fergus Mason
Friday 28th August
Manic Friday dawned following a tawdry attempt by a Lancet Editorial at a hatchet job on the PSE report (http://www.thelancet.com/journals/lancet/article/PIIS0140-6736(15)00042-2/fulltext this was covered by 3 main Newspapers in the UK -Telegraph,Mail,Guardian
swift reactions were made by Chris Snowdon https://health.spectator.co.uk/on-e-cigarette-safety-the-lancet-has-decided-to-shoot-the-messenger/
Konstantinos Farsalinos http://www.ecigarette-research.org/research/index.php/whats-new/whatsnew-2015/14-sample-data-articles/223-phe
Tom Pruen (ECITA) http://www.ecita.org.uk/ecita-blog/once-again-e-cig-opponents-undermine-public-health
Many commentators and blogs took up the cudgels including ASH
Dave Kitson produced this excellent read that summarises many folks thoughts in general in a lucid manner http://wp.thehappyvaper.com/?p=914
Overall Summary
My take on this week is that there are encouraging signs that the pragmatic approach characterised by PHE may be starting to trickle down, despite desperate and pathetic attempts by an increasingly marginalised fringe to stem that flow. The TPD though still looms large, the variations in some European countries regarding implementation is alarming, hence the continued need to keep promoting and pushing this – http://article20legalchallenge.com/
Obviously these need to be completed by as many readers as possible(from anywhere)
Welsh Consultation Document (calling for indoor ban on Vaping) http://www.senedd.assembly.wales/mgConsultationDisplay.aspx?id=181&RPID=1506130373&cp=yes close date 4th September
English Consultation Document https://consultations.dh.gov.uk/tobacco/tobacco-products-directive/consult_view close date 3rd September
