I sent an e-mail to Dr. Oncken:
Dear Dr. Oncken,
Today I read the following article, and frankly, was very disappointed in the dismissive nature of your responses:
Call it E-Puffing, But Don't Do It Indoors | NBC Connecticut
I was a cigarette smoker for 40 years. Smoking killed my parents and my father-in-law, and yet I continued to smoke. I had made several half-hearted attempts to quit in the past, once for almost a year, but never felt like myself, and it always seemed like I was being deprived of something. And a single cigarette never failed to reel me back in. Last October a friend showed me an electronic cigar - I had never heard of such a thing, and was intrigued by it. I did some searching on the internet and stumbled onto e-cigarette-forum.com, which is a community of thousands of e-cigarette users. I did a lot of reading there, and out of curiosity eventually placed an order from one of the recommended suppliers. I smoked my second-to-last tobacco cigarette on November 9, 2009, four days after receiving my order, much to my astonishment. I carried around a pack of cigarettes for the first week or so, but was never tempted to light up. I had some mild cravings for the first couple of weeks, but they were completely manageable and passed quickly - I suspect that this was withdrawal from other chemicals found in tobacco cigarettes. In February, I decided to try a regular cigarette, just to see if I was really done with them. I couldn't finish 3 puffs - it was completely disgusting. That is perhaps the greatest gift the e-cigarette has given me. Now, after nearly 6 months, I have cut my nicotine strength by 75% from where I started, and have begun to occasionally use 0-nicotine e-juice. I don't know if I will ever quit, but for the first time I feel like I have some control over my habit. I have regained my sense of taste and smell, the crackling in my lungs is gone, I can breathe freely, have more energy and stamina, and sleep better - these are all the same things that someone who quit smoking might experience. And the migraine headaches that plagued me for the past 7 years are gone. I no longer inflict cigarette stink or second-hand smoke upon anyone. The only adverse affect I have experienced is occasional dry throat, which is alleviated by simply drinking more water.
My story is far from unusual. In a number of polls, 75-80% of e-cigarette users have completely stopped smoking tobacco cigarettes. The vast majority of users are long-time smokers over the age of 30, with many over the age of 50. These are not being marketed to children - if children have credit cards and can freely spend hundreds of dollars on e-cig equipment, then we have a serious parenting problem.
I would urge you to do honest research on e-cigarettes before making disparaging, cavalier statements about their use. Many people who have tried every method under the sun to give up tobacco cigarettes have found them to be the only thing that works. If some of these people had seen your comments beforehand, they may not have ever considered trying an e-cigarette:
http://www.e-cigarette-forum.com/forum/vapor4life/55402-so-what-your-story.html
I'm sure that you could find any number of e-cigarette users in your area who would be more than happy to be of assistance in a study. Are e-cigarettes perfectly safe? Of course not. But research on propylene glycol inhalation goes back to at least the 1940's, and most available information suggests that e-cigarettes are orders of magnitude less toxic than tobacco cigarettes. For example, there are about 8 nanograms of TSNA in 1 ml. of e-liquid, which is approximately equivalent to half a pack of traditional cigarettes for me. Compare that to 111,900 nanograms of TSNA in a half-pack of Marlboros, along with all the thousands of other chemicals present in a tobacco cigarette, and the byproducts of combustion. Considering the abysmal success rates of current smoking cessation methods, and given the state of our health care system, it would seem that an arguably safer smoking alternative would be welcomed with open arms. But curiously it is dismissed out of hand instead by some. You can have a profound impact on many lives by doing the research and either embracing the e-cigarette as a viable reduced-harm alternative to smoking tobacco, or by providing solid scientific evidence that they are more harmful than tobacco cigarettes.
Sincerely,
Brad Preston
What WAS I thinking 
