A recent press release put out by the American College of Chest Physicians has caused the debate regarding the unknown unknowns of e-cigarettes to rear its head yet again. The College are calling for severe restrictions on electronic cigarettes until their full health impacts are known.
It would appear that all the current data that shows that e cigarettes are of a magnitude less harmful than tobacco cigarettes does not hold water for them.
Could this decision also be a remnant of the light cigarettes fiasco when the tobacco industry led medics and regulators to believe that light tobacco cigarettes were less harmful; something that today we know is not true, hence the wariness around e cigarettes?
Yet e cigarettes are not light cigarettes, and many scientists around the world have carried out far more independent research on them, but admittedly the long-term data is not yet in.
However, writing on his blog. Dr Siegel questions the logic of the American College of Chest Physicians, calling it one of the most disgraceful moves of the year by any medical or Public Health group. Dr Siegel doesnt comprehend why they would want e cigarettes off the market; yet say nothing about the continuing presence of tobacco being freely available, when it is combustible tobacco that does all the harms.
He writes:
The truth is that these groups are stuck - trapped in a blinding ideology in which science plays absolutely no role and positions are based on pure, raw emotion. And the emotion against anything which looks like a cigarette is apparently so strong that it drowns out even the most solid evidence of the life-saving potential of a product that resembles smoking, but delivers nicotine with only a minute fraction of the dangerous chemicals, and which, with proper manufacturing, appears to deliver only one chemical of any significant health concern.
It would appear that all the current data that shows that e cigarettes are of a magnitude less harmful than tobacco cigarettes does not hold water for them.
Could this decision also be a remnant of the light cigarettes fiasco when the tobacco industry led medics and regulators to believe that light tobacco cigarettes were less harmful; something that today we know is not true, hence the wariness around e cigarettes?
Yet e cigarettes are not light cigarettes, and many scientists around the world have carried out far more independent research on them, but admittedly the long-term data is not yet in.
However, writing on his blog. Dr Siegel questions the logic of the American College of Chest Physicians, calling it one of the most disgraceful moves of the year by any medical or Public Health group. Dr Siegel doesnt comprehend why they would want e cigarettes off the market; yet say nothing about the continuing presence of tobacco being freely available, when it is combustible tobacco that does all the harms.
He writes:
The truth is that these groups are stuck - trapped in a blinding ideology in which science plays absolutely no role and positions are based on pure, raw emotion. And the emotion against anything which looks like a cigarette is apparently so strong that it drowns out even the most solid evidence of the life-saving potential of a product that resembles smoking, but delivers nicotine with only a minute fraction of the dangerous chemicals, and which, with proper manufacturing, appears to deliver only one chemical of any significant health concern.
