In the News 4th September

Fridays News at a glance:

Tanks, tanks everywhere – Does being opposed to vaping drive you mad? – Friday Message – Scottish Health and Sport Committee – Center for Environmental Health pretends to have made a breakthrough discovery about e-cigarettes – Glantz confirms vaping will have a positive impact on public health – Nicotine Science and Policy – Daily Digest

Tanks, tanks everywhere…

Facts Do Matter

There is a saying on Twitter, “If you can’t debate in 140 characters or less, you’ve lost the argument”. Sometimes this could be true, but in others the character limit is incredibly limiting, even with character substitutions and abbreviations it is incredibly difficult to get your point across on a complex subject.

This is one of the reasons I have a blog, so I can take my time and be as wordy as I like to explain things….

Does being opposed to vaping drive you mad?

Fergus Mason

Over the last week the behaviour of anti-vaping extremists has gone from bizarre to demented to ridiculous. It looks like they’re failing the “scream test” they’re so keen to apply to their enemies.

Some tobacco control activists like to talk about the “scream test”. If the tobacco industry complains about a new proposal, they say, that must mean the proposal is going to end smoking tomorrow and save lots and lots of children….

Friday Message (PDF)

Duncan Selbie – Public Health England

Being in public health is often being where others aren’t, often in areas that are controversial at the time but that as time goes on and the evidence develops, what was once radical becomes the norm. In the meantime, you have to go with current best available evidence; the publication of our peer reviewed evidence review on e-cigarettes being a case in point….

 Scottish Health and Sport Committee (PDF)

Some excellent and surprising entries in here ,the SPICE analysis towards the end  is interesting:

Many of the comments in support of e-cigarettes refer to them in terms of “harm reduction,” as they are safer to consume than tobacco products. Most written responses to questions 18 and 19 were statements in support of e-cigarette use, either in the form of personal testimonials or “harm reduction” arguments in favour of their use over tobacco cigarettes…..

Center for Environmental Health

Pretends to have made a breakthrough discovery about e-cigarettes – Dr Farsalinos

Nothing surprises me anymore in the field of e-cigarette research, debate and media campaigns which predominantly misinform and distort the truth. This time, the Center for Environmental Health (CEH) has made headline announcements about tests they performed on e-cigarettes, finding the “cancer-causing chemicals” formaldehyde and acetaldehyde. The story has been presented as a new shocking and breakthrough discovery about how bad e-cigarettes are….

Glantz confirms vaping will have a positive impact on public health

Vaping Giraffe

Our dear friend, Dr. Stanton Glantz has once again published a “study”, claiming that e-cigarettes and vaping will have a negative effect on public health. But in fact it can be viewed as a strong argument for the opposite, that vaping will have a very positive impact. I’d say the title of his press release (or whatever this is) says it all: “Ecigs likely to have negative population health effects if more than 20-30% as bad as cigs“….

Nicotine Science and Policy – Daily Digest