Today, the Daily Mail ran an article highlighting new figures released by Mintel, which suggested that E-cigarette use was falling for the first time. Here is our comment.nt on the story and the figures.
Charles Hamshaw-Thomas, UK Vaping Industry Association, said, “Mintel’s research just demonstrates the crisis in public health communication on vaping. This is a practice now enjoyed by millions of people that has not only been endorsed by Cancer Research UK, but Public Health England has also clearly stated it is 95% less harmful than smoking. Additionally, analysis has shown that the people who have switched to vaping, and no longer smoke, already represent a huge saving of £62 billion to the NHS.*
“Yet the message is still struggling to get through to those smokers who could really benefit from making the switch. Dubious claims by studies from abroad make the headlines and feed the public perception that vaping is as bad for them as smoking when the real evidence entirely contradicts that.
“It’s honestly time for the scaremongering to stop. We now need to focus on the facts. The more we allow confusion to reign, the more we are wasting this potentially seismic public health opportunity.”
* A tale of two epidemics: drugs harm reduction and tobacco harm reduction in the United Kingdom, Gerry Stimson, Drugs and Alcohol Today, September 2016, page 209