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The Ely Times - elynews.com :: Opinion: Smoke, smoke, smoke that e-cigarette
Smoke, smoke, smoke that e-cigarette
By Kent Harper
Published: Friday, March 11, 2011 11:16 AM PST
tobacco users aren't welcome on the premises of William Bee Ririe Hospital and its adjacent Rural Health Clinic.
Well, the people are welcome.
It's their cigarettes, cigars, pipes, chewing
tobacco or snuff that aren't welcome.
Starting April 4 the hospital and its grounds will be a
tobacco-free environment. That includes all buildings and the surrounding grounds, including the parking lots. The ban applies to all hospital-owned vehicles and private vehicles located or parking on hospital property.
I don't know how the hospital staff is going to spot a tobacco-chewer with a wad in his cheek sitting out in his pickup truck in the parking lot. And I don't know if the rule will carry the weight of law or if there will ever be penalties greater than being nagged about your health.
That will be worked out in the future as society continues its crusade against tobacco, willing to do whatever it takes to outlaw tobacco except actually outlawing tobacco.
Quitting smoking is difficult.
Some people are physically addicted to nicotine, while for others it's a nervous habit.
And for some people it's both.
When I first started smoking I was 19 and in the Army. I smoked a pipe. I was stationed at Monterey, Calif., and bought my Cavendish-blend from a tobacco shop in nearby Carmel.
When I was transferred to Europe, the tobacconist sent me my blend regularly. I had briar pipes, straight stemmed and curved. I had an old-fashioned clay pipe with a long stem and a calabash pipe, made famous by Sherlock Holmes. I also had several meerschaum pipes, one carved by a Turkish artisan using a photo of my face as the model for the turban-wearing, bearded sultan head that formed the bowl.
My favorite pipe was a curved-stem meerschaum with grape vines carved all around it. As the pipe aged it turned a mellow yellow with a dark brown stain around the rim of the large bowl.
At one time I had about 30 pipes. It was a hobby and a pastime as well as an addiction. I smoked five or six bowls a day, using a different pipe each time to keep them "sweet."
But eventually I switched to smoking cigarettes - much easier than lugging around a collection of pipes, a tobacco pouch and various tools of the trade.
I quite smoking several times and still went back. The last time I quit was almost 25 years ago.
I didn't do it through resolve or self-discipline. I had no choice in the matter. I couldn't breath.
I'd light up a cigarette and begin to cough. Finally, I'd snub it out. But a few minutes later I'd light another one and the coughing and wheezing would return.
It was a horrible way to quit. But it worked.
There are easier methods today. Some work for some people. Other people have to try a different method.
There's nicotine gum and the patch, and always the support-group route.
But there's a fairly new method on the market that has some real potential.
Have you seen the e-cigarettes?
The e-cigarette or electronic cigarette or vapor cigarette looks like a regular cigarette. When the "smoker" takes a puff, a red LED light in the tip glows and looks like the burning tip of a cigarette. The "smoker" exhales a cloud, not of smoke, but of water vapor.
The e-cigarette was invented by Chinese pharmacist Hon Lik in 2003. The company he worked for was called Golden Dragon Holdings, but after realizing the potential for the product, changed its name to Ruyan, which means "to resemble smoking."
And the e-cigarette does. The light flickers with the inhalation and the cloud of water vapor looks like tobacco smoke.
But there's no tobacco in the plastic device and there's no combustion.
The e-cigarettes are made up of several components.
There's the mouthpiece or cartridge. It holds an absorbent material saturated with a liquid nicotine solution. Different flavors and levels of nicotine are available.
Next is the atomizer. It's the heating element that vaporizes the nicotine solution so it can be inhaled. Then there's the lithium-ion rechargeable battery that powers the atomizer. And finally the LED light that mimics a burning cigarette.
There's no second-hand smoke and no fire hazard.
For many smokers, the e-cigarette provides the needed nicotine "fix" and also satisfies the craving to smoke itself and gives them an outlet for their nervousness.
The product is so new, tests determining the health benefits of smoking the e-cigarette as opposed to smoking tobacco have yet to be concluded.
But the American Association of Public Health Physicians supports the electronic devices because they reduce second-hand smoke.
Boston University School of Public Health conducted a study last year and concluded the e-cigarettes were safer than real cigarettes and might help smokers to quit.
Cancer Research UK found that for a smoker, switching to e-cigarettes could be beneficial.
But support for the faux-cigarettes hardly is unanimous. And there's an increasing effort to ban them altogether.
The content of the exhaled vapors is a major concern.
Diethylene glycol and tobacco-specific nitrosamines (TSNAs) are the problem.
Dave Pickrell is the president and founder of Smokers Fighting Discrimination, Inc., a non-profit organization defending the e-cigarettes.
He says complaints that diethylere glycol is an ingredient in anti-freeze are true.
But the chemical also is found in wine, toothpaste, cough syrup, mouthwash, aspirin and other pharmaceuticals.
He says one e-cigarette has 1/10 of the diethylene glycol found in a single aspirin tablet and 1/40th of the amount in an actual tobacco cigarette.
It would take inhaling 12,000 e-cigarette cartridges in a 24-hour period to reach toxic levels. And a heavy smoker would only use three e-cigarettes a day.
But in some states there's concern the flavored, electronic devices would be too tempting to young people.
Washington state has outlawed electronic cigarettes in public places and prohibited their sale to minors. Arizona also plans to ban their sale to minors, as is New York and Pennsylvania.
In New Jersey it's the flavors that worry some lawmakers. A chocolate-flavored e-cigarette could easily serve as a gateway to real tobacco use.
A ban would have happened in California except the cigar-smoking governator vetoed the bill, saying adults should be able to use the products as long as they know there's an associated health risk.
The FDA is fighting a court battle to defend it classifying e-cigarettes as a drug delivery device that should be subject to its authority. But a federal judge has ruled e-cigarettes should be treated the same as any tobacco product.
The U.S. Transportation Department apparently agrees.
U.S. Transportation Secretary Raymond LeHood has begun telling airlines that the FAA's ban on smoking tobacco on airplanes also should apply to the e-cigarette.
Second-hand smoke has long been the argument for banning cigarettes in bars, restaurants and public places in Nevada and elsewhere.
The e-cigarette doesn't burn and doesn't produce second-hand smoke. It has no odor and doesn't result in butts scattered on the ground. It enables smokers to practice their habit without affecting the rest of us.
You can rest assured, however, the lack of second-hand smoke will not save e-cigarettes from the anti-tobacco crusaders.
But don't get too nervous.
For now, at least, you can still puff on one at the hospital or on its grounds or in the parking lot. But do it discretely.
