The Guardian has started 2020 by publishing an article singling out e-cigarette use as one of the few positive healthcare developments of the past decade. This is a welcome change of pace from other recent news coverage of e-cigarette use, could it be an indicator that 2020 could see a change in media opinion on vaping?
2019 was a challenging year for vaping
2019 has seen vaping making the news more than ever, and much of it was unfortunately not showing vaping in a positive light.
The US EVALI (e-cigarette or vaping associated lung injury) cases that presented at the end of 2019 have been thoroughly investigated by the CDC and found to not be caused by vaping nicotine products, but instead illicit THC containing products, you can read our coverage of the CDC findings in our post 'CDC concludes that THC e-liquids caused the US vaping illness outbreak'. However, while the CDC were investigating, the media were busy publishing scaremongering articles and digging up stories of ill health that they could in some way associate with vaping.
The vaping industry feared that these stories could have a devastating effect on the reputation of e-cigarettes, prompting current vapers to discontinue use and for smokers to disregard them as a smoking cessation tool.
The Guardian article
In the article it is expressed that the rise of e-cigarette use has helped contribute to significant drops in smoking rates in the UK, and that they have given ‘smoking cessation a boost at no cost to the public purse.’ This is because the majority of e-cigarette users will make the decision to switch from smoking to vaping and will purchase the items themselves, costing the NHS nothing in prescriptions, but also helping alleviate some of the pressure that smoking related illness would otherwise have been put on NHS services.
They identify how well e-cigarettes are utilised in the UK, with the overwhelming majority using them for their intended purpose, as a stop smoking aid, and only a small percentage of never-smokers have adopted vaping. The UK has also done an excellent job of regulating the vaping industry, and vaping retailers strictly abide by initiatives like ‘Think 25’ to prevent underage and proxy sales. These strict regulations and laws mean that healthcare authorities are able to endorse vaping.
It is suggested that other countries who have adopted laws against vaping or alternatively have somewhat lax vaping laws and regulations, could use the UK as an example for how e-cigarettes can be utilised as a tool for improving public health and decreasing smoking rates.
This article comes as a welcome piece of positive journalism that celebrates the good that the rise of vaping has achieved in the UK. While vaping is becoming more and more popular in the UK as a stop smoking aid, the vaping industry and healthcare authorities consistently find that there is still a huge amount of misunderstanding surrounding the risks of vaping relative to smoking, and many people still wrongly believe that vaping is as harmful as smoking. We can only hope that this is the beginning of a change in opinion from the media, and that more positive stories will follow in 2020.
