Vapers Digest 25th November

Monday’s News at a glance:

Survey Highlights Ban Impact – Indonesia’s Misguided Policies Questioned – Smoking and Vaping Prevalence Charts That the FDA and CDC Don’t Want You to See – American Heart Association and American Cancer Society are Still Spreading Misinformation – Spain asks for public’s views on flavoured vapes ban – Thinking ’bout THR Events & Opportunities – Is Trump’s Pick For Surgeon General Good For Vaping? – Trump Announces Choices to Lead FDA and CDC – Cigarette Alternatives – Staying Alive Podcast Ft. Jordan Dittloff – The Case for Vaping – Joint smoking–vaping prevalence rates among American youth and young adults 2011–2022

Two from Dave Cross, Planet of the Vapes:

Survey Highlights Ban Impact

The United Kingdom is going to ban disposable vapes from the 1st June 2025. Retailer Vape Superstore has investigated the implications of the disposable ban and other proposed vaping restrictions – and how the future of the vaping landscape will change in the coming years. Concerns exist that the Tobacco and Vapes Bill will serve to fuel an already out of control black market.

Vape Superstore says that combining the UK government ban on the sale of all disposable vapes, the addition of a new £2.20 per 10ml vaping tax, and the potential restrictions on ecig packaging and eliquid flavours, concerns are high that an already out of control black market will continue to grow.

Two million vapers could switch BACK to smoking – The Sun

Indonesia’s Misguided Policies Questioned

In a statement released to Planet of the Vapes, the Coalition of Asia Pacific Harm Reduction Advocates (CAPHRA) has strongly questioned the justification behind Indonesia’s proposed tobacco control measures on safer nicotine products such as vapes. The new policies being proposed include treating vaping products the same as combustible cigarettes, with plain packaging, display bans, flavour limitations and restrictions on retailer locations.

Nancy Loucas, Executive Coordinator of the Coalition of Asia Pacific Harm Reduction Advocates, told Planet of the Vapes: “Indonesia’s proposed measures are a step backward in the fight against smoking-related diseases….

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Smoking and Vaping Prevalence Charts…

That the FDA and CDC Don’t Want You to See

Brad Rodu, Tobacco Truth,

My colleague and I have published a new article in Harm Reduction Journal entitled “Joint Smoking-Vaping Prevalence Rates Among American Youth and Young Adults 2011-2022.” This post is dedicated to U.S. federal government officials, especially at the FDA Center for Tobacco Products and the CDC Office of Smoking and Health. Despite having smoking and vaping data from federal surveys for the past thirteen years, those officials have never published joint prevalence rates.

I present two charts on the left, but please read the full article for more information (here).  The charts speak for themselves, so I won’t bore you with unnecessary details.  The first shows that smoking among high schoolers has basically disappeared at the same time that vaping skyrocketed up…then down.

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American Heart Association and…

American Cancer Society are Still Spreading Misinformation

Michael Siegel, The Rest of the Story

After the start of the COVID-19 pandemic, I took an almost complete break from blogging about tobacco policy to concentrate on some other public health topics. Now that more than 4 years have passed, I decided to take a look at the websites of some of the major national health organizations to see whether they have started to accurately communicate the facts about vaping and smoking. I figured that during the past 4 years there has been so much definitive science about the relative risks of vaping and smoking, the cause of EVALI, the question of whether youth vaping is a gateway to smoking…

Spain asks for public’s views…

On flavoured vapes ban – Ali Anderson

The Spanish government is asking for the public’s views on its proposed flavoured vapes ban. The ban is part of the new ‘Anti-Tobacco Plan,’ which aims to limit products that cause a risk to young people’s health and are a ‘gateway’ to smoking.

The royal decree, which opened to public consultation on Thursday, proposes a ban on all flavoured vapes except tobacco. It also aims to regulate the labelling of vapes that do not contain nicotine.

Thinking ’bout THR Events Opportunities

Kim “Skip” Murray

Answering reader questions and suggestions: A reader thought it was confusing to have a 2024 Event, 2024 Opportunity, 2025 Event, 2025 Opportunity, etc. format, as they had to keep scrolling and track what was what if they were only interested in events.

This edition of E&O is formatted differently. Let me know if you like it. All Events are together and in order by date. After the events section is the Opportunities section, so you must scroll down to find that part. The third section is Awareness Campaigns.

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Is Trump’s Pick For Surgeon General…

Good For Vaping? | RegWatch

As reported by Politico, President-elect Donald Trump announced Friday that Dr. Janette Nesheiwat is his choice to serve as Surgeon General in his new administration.

Dr. Nesheiwat is a Fox News medical contributor and currently serves as medical director at CityMD, a network of urgent care centers in New York and New Jersey.

Trump Announces Choices to …

Lead FDA and CDC, and Surgeon General – Jim McDonald

Donald Trump has named Johns Hopkins surgeon and professor Martin Makary as his choice for the next commissioner of the Food and Drug Administration (FDA). He has also announced his choices for the director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), and the Surgeon General post.

The FDA regulates all consumer nicotine products, including vapes. The CDC and Surgeon General have no regulatory powers, but have caused considerable reputational damage to vaping in the past.

Cigarette Alternatives

Dr. John Oyston

Several consumer products can act as safer alternatives to deadly cigarettes, but they are not being promoted effectively. In fact, more and more political action is making them less pleasant, more expensive, and more difficult to obtain. Health Canada needs to radically rethink its attitudes to safer nicotine products such as vape, heat-not-burn, snus and nicotine pouches. Millions of lives are at stake.

This is the full text of a letter to Mark Holland, the Health Minister and Ya’ara Saks, Minister of Mental Health and Addictions.

I am getting letters of support for us

Mark Tyndall

Dear Minister Saks: I am writing this letter to express my concern and state my opposition to the proposed flavour ban on vaping products in Canada.

As a public health physician and former director of the BC Centre for Disease Control, I am very aware of the position of my public health colleagues around vaping. While promoting many public health policies and programs that incorporate harm reduction principles, like condoms, seatbelts, bicycle helmets, and clean needle distribution, they have a glaring blind spot around vaping and safer nicotine products.

Staying Alive Podcast Ft. Jordan Dittloff

The Case for Vaping

Parker DeVore

Vaping could be the next vaccine, a miracle of modern science that saves four million lives each year — if only we would let it. I think more people should vape.

I love a hot take, and this is one of my favorite stock ones, along with banning credit cards and speed limits. It never fails to get a rise out of people, but that’s not why I go for it. Like the other hot takes, I really do believe that it’s true, no matter how counterintuitive it might seem. But how could I say that? Am I really that hooked, or have the heavy metals seeped into my brain?

Joint smoking–vaping prevalence rates

Among American youth and young adults 2011–2022

Brad Rodu & Nantaporn Plurphanswat

The Center for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) annually tracks American youth and adult smoking prevalence using data from the National Youth Tobacco Survey (NYTS) and the National Health Interview Survey (NHIS). The NYTS and the NHIS began collecting information on vaping in 2011 and 2014 respectively. However, since those years the CDC has only reported smoking and vaping rates separately, which presents a long-term and important information gap, given the decade-long debate about whether e-cigarettes help people who smoke reduce or quit, and whether they are a gateway to youth smoking.

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On this Day…2023

A look back at how things have moved on or otherwise…

Two from Dave Cross, Planet of the Vapes:

French Plans Will Push People To Smoke

Latest developments on the nicotine and tobacco policy in France risk pushing former smokers back to smoking, says consumer advocacy organisation World Vapers’ Alliance. On Tuesday, 14 November, French Health Minister Aurélien Rousseau opened the door to a possible ban on the sale of nicotine pouches in France in a talk show on Sud Radio.

Health Minister Rousseau is currently developing a new Tobacco Control Framework to tackle smoking in France and is working with the government on the disposable vape ban.

Smoke Free Sweden Welcomes Report

The Smoke Free Sweden initiative is delighted to share the news that a new report published in the Journal of the American Medical Association Internal Medicine debunks the gateway effect. The report, titled ‘Shift From Smoking Cigarettes to Vaping Nicotine in Young Adults’, discredits the common misconception that vaping leads non-smokers to cigarette smoking.

The survey concluded: “These data reveal a shift in tobacco use among young adults, showing historically low cigarette use, which has positive public health significance. However, e-cigarette use is higher (14.5%) than reported previously (11%), coinciding with the introduction of salt-based devices in 2015 to 2018. Over half of established vaping young adults never regularly smoked. Research suggests that exclusive e-cigarette users are unlikely to transition to combustible tobacco.”

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Visit Nicotine Science & Policy for more News from around the World

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