Outrageous Lies Are Becoming A Flood Surrounding E-Cigs

Earlier this week, estranged tobacco controller Michael Siegel (who is persona non gratis within his industry for the crime of retaining some principles) reported on a press release from Americans for Non-Smokers Rights.

Americans for Nonsmokers' Rights Publicly Claims that Electronic Cigarettes are Not Useful in Smoking Cessation, Despite Any Scientific Support for Its Statement

In a press release issued yesterday, Americans for Nonsmokers' Rights (ANR) publicly claimed that electronic cigarettes are not helpful for smoking cessation, despite the lack of any scientific evidence to back up its assertion (and in the presence of much scientific evidence to contradict its statement). 

[...] 

... ANR is lying when it states that there is no scientific evidence that e-cigarettes are an an effective cessation tool. 

There is abundant evidence that literally thousands (if not tens of thousands) of electronic cigarette users have successfully used these products to either quit smoking or to cut down substantially on the amount that they smoke. A clinical trial has demonstrated that among smokers who were not motivated to quit, 54% were able to quit completely or to cut down by at least half on the amount they smoke.

It's no surprise to catch an anti-smoking agency lying - after all, it's been a major plank of their global activities for decades. However, the blatant nature of the lies on show here towards e-cigs is quite astounding. Here's the quote in question from their executive director, Cynthia Hallett.

"What I find most egregious are the direct advertisements with false and misleading claims, including that e-cigarettes are effective smoking cessation devices, that e-cigarette use is permissible in all indoor environments, including venues that are smoke-free, and targeting pregnant women claiming that e-cigarettes are safer and healthier than other tobacco products."

Err, but e-cigarette use is permissible in most indoor environments because it hasn't been included in smokefree legislation in the vast majority of cases. How is that false or misleading? And it is very clear that they are safer and healthier than other tobacco products, and have been proven to be so.

What I, myself, find egregious, love, is the fact that you are deliberately scaring people away from products which have immense potential for harm reduction, much of it very well documented and even clinically proven. And that this is done by trying to claim that e-cigs are equally as damaging as smoked tobacco, which is not even close to the truth.

As if to prove the old adage about lies flying round before boots can be donned, the Missouri News Tribune is just one of many sources who have acted as an outlet for this utter garbage. Going the whole hog, it further quotes other dangerous idiocy vomited up by the original press release.

The group points to a study recently published in Indoor Air, which measured the contents of exhaled e-cigarette vapor and found that exhaling the vapor releases measurable amounts of carcinogens and toxins into the air, including nicotine, formaldehyde and acetaldehyde.

Passive vaping? Yup, she's actually - with a serious tone - stopping people from using e-cigs as a potential way of quitting by invoking the fantasy problem of passive vaping, as covered here just recently following the dribbling rantings of Raving Mad Stan. To offer some perspective to Hallett's moral panicking, here is how they came to those 'conclusions'

Of note is the fact that the quantities measured for conventional cigarette smoke for these chemicals ranged from two to forty times higher, yet the quantities measured were so tiny that, even in smoke, none met or exceeded the Exposure Limit.

Firstly, it has to be emphasised that just this part - of a study referenced by Hallett herself, remember - comprehensively debunks her previous assertion that e-cigs are no safer than lit tobacco, but we'll carry on.

Concerned that some compounds that they expected to measure in the chamber tests were missing and/or present in barely detectible amounts, the researchers decided to measure VOCs directly in exhaled breath.

Yes, they did it again. Short of any proper scientific evidence of any attributable harm from exhaled e-cig vapour, they changed the methodology to ensure they would get some kind of measurement, however miniscule. It's a favourite mendacious tactic of theirs. As the author of that piece points out, the only way anyone would receive such minute traces of the chemicals mentioned at all is if they were snogging the vaper at the very moment they breathed out.

That is the definition of 'measurable' for the pharma cash addicted tobacco control industry.

It would seem that the three line whip from the WHO (who are equally in the thrall of pharma companies) on e-cigs is being adhered to by the global tobacco control industry and - as a result - we are seeing some of the most spectacular lies ever witnessed in the history of 'public health'.

The ANPR press release really is truly laughable, or would be if it weren't so hideously dangerous. When the time comes - and it will, without doubt - that e-cigs are proven beyond doubt to be a device overwhelmingly safer than smoking, there will be more than red faces. In litigious America, especially, I hope there will be some multi-million dollar law suits filed in the future citing these disgusting people for negligent advice and stripping them of every possession they have ever owned.

If they get away with living the rest of their days on a park bench, they should consider it a right result because some serious jail time on top is a more appropriate punishment.

I'll leave the last word to David Sweanor, former advisor to the WHO on tobacco control. For the likes of Hallett, and other irresponsible psychopaths, it should be akin to looking in a mirror.

"For anti-nicotine campaigners who say we need to wait for more research I would point out the way they are proving Nietzsche correct – we take on the attributes of our enemies. Cigarette companies spent decades making spurious claims that we need ‘more research’ before we could move on policy measures, despite the already-existing basis for informed policy measures. They provide very poor role models."

Or perhaps to Orwell.

“The creatures outside looked from pig to man, and from man to pig, and from pig to man again; but already it was impossible to say which was which."

I'll say this one more time, just for good measure. It has NEVER been about health.