Vaping is under siege right now and some places, such as the state of Washington, have banned flavored e-liquids while others consider doing the same. For many vapers, the impact of these bans is sure to be felt once their current stash of flavored e-liquids runs out. As a result, some vapers have already made a point to stock up, lest they run out and have to face the impact of a ban on flavored e-liquid.
For many vapers who formerly smoked, vaping is seen in a positive light. While this might confuse or even stun some, many vapers have proactively switched to vaping from smoking in an attempt to reduce risk. While many of us already know that smoking kills hundreds of thousands of people in the United States every year, many are unaware of the growing body of scientific evidence that suggests vaping is less harmful than smoking. This is information that many former smokers who have switched to vaping already know. For some of these smokers turned vapers, flavored e-liquids almost certainly helped them make the switch. Not everyone enjoys standard flavors of e-liquid like menthol and tobacco, which is why having a wide variety of flavors may be helpful to some.
Back to the scientific body of evidence that suggests vaping is less harmful for a moment, as this is a statement worth examining in more detail. Public Health England, which is part of the United Kingdom’s public healthcare system, was required to undertake an e-cigarette evidence review. Independent experts that carried out the review examined the available scientific evidence and found that the evidence points to vaping being less harmful than smoking. To put a number on it, PHE said that vaping is likely 95% less harmful. That’s what they found.
There are a lot of vapers that have switched over from smoking after catching wind of the review’s findings as well as other the findings of other scientific studies that have been carried out by various researchers. Now if you didn’t already know about all of this, well, now you do. Keeping all of this mind, try to imagine how a vaper that has quit smoking with the help of vaping feels about having some of the vaping products that they’ve used to quit smoking made inaccessible to them.
It would seem, based on all of this, that there are both vapers and smokers who stand to lose from banning flavored e-liquids. This raises the question of why would anyone think to ban flavored e-liquids? One reason, cited by many, is that flavored e-cigs appeal to young vapers and that the youth must be protected. This leaves adults who might find potential benefit in using flavored e-liquids out in the cold. Perhaps there’s a compromise that could allow those who could potentially benefit to retain access to flavored e-liquids while still restricting access to today’s youth. A solution to this problem might benefit the youth in more ways than one and, of course, the adults who might benefit from these products.
The strangest part about all of this, the banning and potential banning of flavored e-liquids, might have to be the fact that it does nothing to tackle the issue of smoking, which kills over eight million people a year. With millions dying each year, one might logically think that the focus should be on getting people to quit smoking, even if it means getting them to switch to what might be a less harmful alternative. If PHE’s estimate is correct, vaping is exactly that and smokers should be getting help switching to vaping. In the United Kingdom, that’s exactly what’s happening. There are voucher programs for free vape kits, vape shops inside of hospitals, and other forms of assistance aimed at helping smokers switch to vaping.
