So, I just mailed this to the Petaluma City Council members:
Dear Ladies and Gentlemen,
As a sometime visitor to Petaluma, I am dismayed that the American Lung Association member who presented information on electronic cigarettes to the city council was presenting information to you that is 4 years out-of-date. Here is the statement from the American Association of Public Health Physicians:
American Association of Public Health Physicians - Tobacco which includes:
Principles to Guide AAPHP tobacco Policy
1. AAPHP tobacco policy should be based on the best available scientific evidence.
2. Tobacco use is a major cause of illness and death in the United States.
3. Almost all tobacco-attributable mortality in the USA is due to cigarette smoking.
10. smokers unable or uninterested in quitting should consider switching. to a less hazardous smoke-free tobacco/nicotine product for as long as they feel the need for such a product. Such products include pharmaceutical Nicotine Replacement Therapy (NRT) products used, off-label, on a long term basis;, electronic e cigarettes, dissolvables (sticks, strips and orbs), snus, other forms of moist snuff, and chewing tobacco.
I have not found any research
at all by the ALA that shows any harm from electronic cigarette vapor. The FDA's published actual study results (which do not agree with their own press release!) showed nothing more harmful in e-liquid than what is in FDA-approved patches or nicotine inhalers.
There has been a study that proves the second-hand vapor from electronic cigarettes is no more harmful than second-hand coffee steam from the next table over:
Latest Studies Confirm E-Cigarette Vapor Safety
There has been a study showing that electronic cigarettes are much more successful at getting long-term smokers who did not want to quit, to quit anyway. The information on these studies can be found at CASAA.org, a consumer group for smoke-free alternatives. (Yes, I'm a member.)
The contents of the e-liquid are very very well-known: propylene glycol and vegetable glycerine, which are in a lot of foods and medicines, and in asthma inhalers, stage smoke (recently used in clouds around
children to make an anti-smoking commercial!), food flavorings, and small amounts of nicotine. The nicotine was
NOT exhaled, nor we most of the other ingredients not counting food flavorings.
Banning this in peoples' homes will have the side-effect of encouraging continued smoking, as there will be no advantage to offset the expense and difficulty of learning to use e-cigs.
This in turn will lead to more second-hand smoke and cigarette butts in your city, as people who might have otherwise switched decide they might as well not bother. Worse, both the no-smoking and no-vaping parts of the law will be heavily ignored, but
as baby-boomers age, the danger of fires from falling asleep while smoking combustibles will rise. There is
no fire or combustion in e-cigs. Major brands all have a 10-second timer in the switch which means that even if someone were to fall asleep with their finger pressing the button, there will be no fire. Ask your Fire Chief which he'd prefer.
(My real name) Grandmother, Frequent driver of 101, Software Engineer, ex-smoker.
