Help needed! With letter to Prof. Robert West.

[twiglet]

Public health relationship with vapers.

There is a fundamental misunderstanding among many in public health concerning both smokers and vapers alike. Many in public health seem to view recreational nicotine users, including these two groups, as the victims of the evil tobacco companies, and feel that their job will not be done until their foes are vanquished, regardless of the number of lives lost in the process. The misunderstanding arises because PH has not, until very recently, engaged with either smokers or vapers in any capacity other than to try to 'cure' them, and they do so from the stand point of their own misperceptions, because they never ask the right questions let alone listen to the answers.

One example of this is the statistics we see so often of the number of smokers who want to quit. No one ever seems to ask them why they want to quit. The closest we see is a question about why people decided to start vaping and the choices are broadly, health, financial, or temporary abstinence related. What they fail to pick up in the data is that very many smokers enjoy smoking, but would simply rather it didn't come with the risks involved. They also fail to pick up the many positive reasons that people enjoy vaping (as opposed to negative reasons such as not getting lung cancer), most of which will be obliterated by the TPD.

Some in public health are at last starting to listen, but others seem so entrenched in their anti tobacco industry views that they cannot bring themselves to listen to the views of the only people who matter, the consumers, because consumers do not share their hatred of the tobacco industry to the same extent, if at all. To accept that recreational nicotine users by and large do not see themselves as victims and have found their own way to use nicotine in vastly safer ways with no help from them destroys their self image as the saviours of humanity.

Much of the potential benefit that PVs could have offered to the health of the population may well have already been lost via a combination of scaremongering in the press by organisations such as the BMA and WHO, usage bans by organisations following their lead and the upcoming implementation of the TPD. Although there were dissenting voices the silence of many in public health who should know better has contributed to the damage.

There is still time to salvage something from the mess, but this will only be achieved if there is a concerted effort from those with influence to do so. Sticking heads in the sand and hoping that regulation will make it all go away is no longer an option.

In my humble opinion!

[angryoldgit]

This was my idea for a letter to Professor West; use it if you think it's helpful!

Dear Professor West,

As a scientist you must be, I am sure, heartily sick of seeing science perverted in the way that it has been in the war on tobacco. For many years now there has been much research conducted into all aspects of smoking; some has been meaningful, but much has been of questionable quality, and even more has been downright fallacious. The purpose of the research has been stated to be for the purpose of improving human health, protecting public safety, and saving life but, as you will know quite well, results have been manipulated, cherry-picked, suppressed and laundered in order to serve the vested interests of those who sponsor the research. The motivations of those bodies may in some cases have been genuine altruism, but there can be little doubt that political and commercial interests have also been served. The net result has, of course, been the gradual stigmatisation, demonisation and segregation of a group once a majority of the population, now a minority; those who smoke tobacco.

We have become accustomed to seeing smokers accused not only of self-harm, but of harming society. In this way, it has been possible for public opinion to be turned against smokers, enabling the imposition of bans on smoking in enclosed public places, and even the extension of such bans to places that were never covered by the Health Act 2006. Not surprisingly, many smokers have sought to quit the habit. Some succeeded by willpower alone, some by recourse to nicotine replacement therapy (NRT), but overwhelmingly successful has been the introduction of personal vapourisers, or e-cigarettes, first introduced in 2005 and now used by some 2 million people in the UK. Most of these people are former smokers, ex-smokers, non-smokers who have eschewed tobacco because of its capacity to harm health. They do not smoke, but they continue to enjoy nicotine in a much safer way for them personally, but also in a way that can have little or no effect on fellow non-smokers around them.

However, the same corrupted science that was used to stigmatise smokers is now being turned against non-smokers, that is vapers. In the absence of any proven harm either to themselves or to society, they are still being attacked by the self-appointed health watchdogs who insist on a 'quit or die' approach, on extending bans to include e-cigarettes, on regulating e-cigarettes to the point that they are forcing non-smokers back into smoking – the very reverse of the stated intention of the anti-smoking lobby!

As a respected scientist, you are in a position to help us correct this lamentable state of affairs. We need people like yourself to help us make known the true science about nicotine usage and harm-reduction strategies so that legislators are in possession of true statistics, valid information and meaningful data when considering new regulations and legal enactments. Will you please be true to your calling, and help us to enjoy our non-smoking lives?

[seniorphil]

Thank you very much everyone who has contributed, I've certainly got my work cut out to condense all of it into 500 words.
If I had of posted this on other forums the thread would of descended into chaos.

[vigowomble]

seniorphil, if you hadn't already watched them, I would recommend that you watch these two episodes of Vapour Trails Talk. The first covers the recent Public Health England meeting on e-cigs, which will give a good overview of the current state of play.

The second has Robert West as a guest, so you can see his current thinking on e-cigs and both will perhaps alter the contents of the letter you are writing.

Both are very good and I'd recommend everyone watch them.

[baron]

What rather amuses me about all this, is that many Doctors will say that 'vaping' is perhaps slightly better than smoking cigarettes, and are still not sure about the ingredients, not enough research, tests etc.
They also harp on about nicotine, but seem to listen to someone who says that you can buy nicotine free liquids.

Yet, are quite happy to prescribe nicotine patches, gum, vapourisers etc. to get you to stop smoking, all with a huge list of ingredients.

These are also the same Doctors who will prescribe some medicine to try and cure whatever it is you have, but have you actually looked at the whole list of possible side affects, which may need more medication to combat those side affects ?

Seems rather weird to me..