I feel rather pessimistic about the prospect of getting through their thick skulls. Nevertheless, here's what I wrote. I'm mad at them, so please tell me if it's too harsh.
Thank you for taking the time to read this. I am just a private citizen and consumer. I have absolutely no direct or indirect financial stake or interest in tobacco products, e-cigarette products, pharmaceutical products, or in any of the companies that make and sell them, nor do I have a stake in any public health organization or in any organization advocating or promoting e-cigarettes.
I’m 67. I started smoking at age 16, worked up to at least a pack of cigarettes per day, often more, and smoked almost every day for 50 years, thus exposing myself, my family and others around me to a host of harmful substances. I’m a fairly successful attorney, former Army medic and former varsity track athlete. I like to think of myself as intelligent, but I could not break the smoking habit. Incidentally, the editor-in-chief of my law school's law review, a highly intelligent person, smoked as long as I did and now suffers from severe emphysema.
My father, a wonderful, kind and brilliant man but a lifelong smoker, died a horrible death from lung cancer, left my mother a widow, and never got to meet his granddaughter. I knew what was in store for me if I continued on the same path and so I tried quitting many times: cold turkey, nicotine patches, counseling, nicotine gum, hypnotism, drugs, inspirational books, etc. None of these worked and so I continued to smoke, fully anticipating that it would probably kill me sooner or later. And then along came e-cigarettes. They proved to be the only answer for me. Others may succeed with other methods and I applaud them.
I started out with an e-liquid with a strong nicotine concentration of 36 mg/ml and I've been able to gradually reduce that over time. I haven't smoked a single cigarette in three years. My wife and daughter are happy about that. My doctor says my overall health has greatly improved and he is now recommending e-cigarettes to his patients who smoke.
I don't miss smoking at all. I feel better than I have in years, energized, and I breathe freely. I no longer cough, I have better stamina, better lung capacity, I can exercise, I no longer dread emphysema, my clothes don't smell of cigarettes, there are no cigarette butts and ashtrays in my house, and I can "vape" in some public places rather than leaving my wife alone, venturing out in inclement weather, shivering in the cold, feeling like an outcast, and inhaling second hand smoke. Bans on vaping in public places threaten to force me right back outside with the smokers. I quit smoking and it seems I’m still demonized as major threat to public health. Yet, there is no credible evidence that I pose a threat to anyone. Of course, I fully realize that evidence has little to do with it. Children might get the idea that it’s “cool” at the mere sight of an old man vaping. Or it might “re-normalize” smoking. Gosh, it might even inspire vampires to attack us in the night!
I found that the little things sold in convenience stores, gas stations and kiosks that try to look like cigarettes are unsatisfactory. These are clumsy, primitive, costly devices. I tried them and quickly reverted to smoking cigarettes. Many of these products are manufactured and sold by big tobacco companies. But, thanks to small, innovative manufacturers competing for business, the second and third generation products are vastly better and have made it possible for me to quit smoking for good. It is wrong for you to call them "tobacco companies."
I would never consider going back to smoking, but I am afraid there are powerful forces promoting junk science and ill-informed knee-jerk zealots at work who would like to see these innovative products and the small companies that produce and sell them regulated into oblivion. The costs of applying for approval will simply be too great for them. Some of the statements now being made to justify draconian regulation are astonishingly ignorant, unscientific, or outright lies. If the situation doesn't change, there will be millions of cigarette smokers who will lose out on a great opportunity to prolong their lives.
If these innovative products can no longer be sold legally, they or others like them will be sold illegally and they will probably be just as easy to get as alcoholic beverages during Prohibition. I'm sure I'll have no problem getting them. Of course, there will be no way to know who made them or whether they have been made with contaminated or dangerous ingredients.
I fear that the FDA will promulgate regulations based on bad science performed by biased researchers. For example, I note that the FDA is funding research on e-cigarettes and one of the beneficiaries of that funding is one Dr. Adam Goldstein. He is the same person who said this: "It [e-cigarette vapor] could be several thousand degrees when it hits your lungs."
Doctor: E-cigarettes don't help smokers kick habit :: WRAL.com (They don’t seem able to spell cigarettes on that site). Dr. Goldstein was given an opportunity to retract that statement or to claim he was misquoted. He has not done so.
I would think that a third grader, much less somebody with a doctorate degree, knows that any substance hitting human lungs at temperatures approaching several thousand degrees would instantly incinerate them. Where are all the the reports of users suffering significant harm, much less killed, by e-cigarettes? In the same article he is quoted as saying that e-cigarettes are of no use whatsoever in helping people quit smoking. I personally know that is false, and millions of others know it is false. I have no idea what motivates him, but perhaps it has something to do with the fact that he receives substantial funding from Pfizer. Or maybe he just can’t admit he was ever wrong about anything. Statements of this kind reflect unscientific bias and, in my opinion, disqualify Dr. Goldstein from conducting any sort of study of e-cigarettes with our tax dollars. Why do you choose people like this? How do you screen them? Are they your pals? I have worked very hard for the money I pay in taxes and I am getting the awful feeling that you are using it to hire biased people to attack me.
Thank you again for your attention to this important issue.
Why is it that almost everyone here knows this - not that all need it but at least know this to be true of either themselves or other fellow posters and this guy hasn't a clue?"
