School districts rewrite tobacco policies to counter teen e-cigarette use

[Kryyptyk]

"Rising use among teens is a worrisome trend to school officials who are increasingly changing their tobacco policies to ban the e-devices. This week, both the Antioch and San Ramon Valley school districts will decide the issue."

More:[URL="http://www.contracostatimes.com/west-county-times/ci_25090482/school-districts-rewrite-tobacco-policies-counter-teen-e.html"]
http://www.contracostatimes.com/west-county-times/ci_25090482/school-districts-rewrite-tobacco-policies-counter-teen-e.html[/URL]

Here is where they lost me:

"Yet the devices, which cannot be sold in the state of California to anyone younger than 18, do contain liquid nicotine vapors and other toxic chemicals, and they are not regulated by the Food and Drug Administration, so their health hazards are still unknown, experts say.
And because e-cigarettes mimic smoking, they become a gateway for many teens to try traditional smoking and other addictive behaviors, said Stanton Glantz, director of the Center for Tobacco Control Research and Education at UC San Francisco."

The sad thing is, this is happening where I live too, and probably all over the country. These critics don't seem to understand that kids are going to mimic what the adults do. And while I agree that vapes have no place in high schools, I don't agree with how they are persistently demonizing them with rumors and disinformation to get their point across.

What do you guys think?

 

[Elizabeth Baldwin]

I totally agree with you! Kids are going to try things, its just what they o out of curiosity! I think vaping is much better than drugs, alcohol, or smoking. Kids shouldn't be doing anything, but making vaping out as they do they're actually pushing them more toward the more dangerous things! They put vaping in the same category as smoking and that's just insane! It's misinformation like this that will cause a national uproar and bans. It makes me mad!

 

[twgbonehead]

While I think it's fine for school districts to ban e-cigarette use, the misinformation in the article is just a load of crap.

Not surprising, the BS from glANTZ.

 

[Uma]

Those pens are ZERO nicotine.
Even if they contained nicotine, it is NOT boosted with ammonia and other ingredients like real smokes are/were. They'll be able to walk away, just like the thousands of Vapers who cut down their nicotine to zero after a spell.

Slantzz pushes for big Pharma, plain & simple.

 

[Uma]

My comment got moderated. Guess I was a touch perturbed ....

 

[Roger_Lafayette]

I will breathe (or vape) a great sigh of relief once bans on sales to minors and possession restrictions are passed in all jurisdictions.

Even that will not mean that we're out of the woods, because bans on interstate sales (i.e. a F2F requirement for purchases), and confiscatory taxes will be justified on the grounds of protecting minors. Oh yes, and restrictions on licenses to B&M stores (and their locations) will also be proposed for similar reasons. I also fear we will lose flavored e-juices as a result, and will therefore have to DIY our own. Minors and the "gateway argument" will definitely change the world of vaping as we presently know it, very much for the worse - and with little if any offsetting gains to public health.

But at least:

1) There will be fewer media stories that stoke anti-vaping fires based on the "gateway" argument and/or junk science, etc.

2) There will be fewer opportunities for simple minor bans to "morph" into legislation that simply incorporates-by-reference all restrictions on the use and distribution of tobacco. This "bait and switch" tactic has worked before: a simple minor ban has been proposed, vapers support it, and then presto! someeone gets the bright idea to create a simpler resolution that simply defines vaping as smoking for all regulatory purposes.

3) There will be fewer chances for ANTZ orgs to engage in fear-mongering whenever any legal restrictions on vaping are imposed, and/or to beat vapers up with the guilt-by-BT-association argument.

(That said, I feel sorry for teachers and other school staff who won't be allowed to vape on school grounds - although we probably won't be able to vape on any public property in the future, no matter where it is.)

***

More on minors and the bogus "gateway" argument, can be found by doing site-specific googles of http://tobaccoanalysis.blogspot.com or E-Cigarette Politics or Anti-THR Lies and related topics | because cultivating the truth requires both seeding and weeding (i.e. google KEYWORD site:domain).

 

[rothenbj]

Flavor will never be a problem. A flavor mix can be sold and added to any unflavored nicquid or, what I've been doing lately, adding a few drops of a flavor to a tobacco nicquid base and get what you desire.

 

[Roger_Lafayette]

Flavor will never be a problem. A flavor mix can be sold and added to any unflavored nicquid or, what I've been doing lately, adding a few drops of a flavor to a tobacco nicquid base and get what you desire.

I don't think you'll be able to buy unflavored niquid once this whole minors thing takes its course.

There will be plenty in my freezer of course ... but it won't last forever.

Fortunately I still have a taste left for menthol, from the bad old days twenty-five years ago ... when I imbibed other stuff.

And I'm trying not to get myself accustomed to anything besides menthol and tobacco flavors. Maybe it's the former smoker in me, I'm too used to having my toys taken away

 

[WileECoyote]

I just can't comprehend vaping leading to smoking. For most if not all people tend to leaving smoking for vaping.

 

[tommy2bad]

The whole point about ecigs not being regulated is a mis direction. They imply that regulation would be about whats in ecigs, it won't be, it will be regulating the use of ecigs. Apart from the nic content all regulations will be to cover advertising, public use and who can use them. Their will be no regulation on levels of contaminants, no regulation on quality standards, no regulation on anything that would make it a better produce.
What scares them is that they don't control how we use nicotine any more. They want that control back.