How many people in the UK have tried e-cigs?

A recent survey came up with some fantastic stats about electronic cigarettes.

How many people have heard of the electronic cigarette?

For instance, did you realise that less than half of Brits have still not heard of electronic cigarettes.As the graph below shows, just 46% of the UK respondents knew what an e-cig was - although awareness is higher in some other countries, with 64% of Finns expressing awareness.

What

What do people think of electronic cigarettes?

Sadly, 41% of smokers and and 33% of non-smokers think e-cigs are bad for their health.

As the graph for UK opinions below shows, the results were more positive for the UK.

Asked: Do you think they [electronic cigarettes] are harmful or not, Brits answered as followed:

Are

The question (are e-cigs harmful to your health) was, unfortunately, the wrong question to ask.

The question should have been:

Do you think e-cigs are:
  • more harmful than cigarettes?
  • less harmful than cigarettes?
  • equally harmful as cigarettes?
Scientists maintain that nicotine delivered without tar, tobacco and carcinogens are equivalent to a cup of coffee. Still harmful - but there's just no comparison to the danger of smoking.

How many people have tried e-cigarettes?

8 % of UK respondents had tried the electronic cigarette.

Have

That broke down into:

  • 1% regular users
  • 2% occasional users
  • 6% had tried it once or twice
Again, I think this question is flawed because what we really need to know is what percentage of smokers have tried e-cigarettes, as the product is irrelevant to non-smokers.

Personally, I think that in the long run (decades rather than years) hardly anyone is going to smoke regular cigarettes! What do you think?

Thanks to Kate for posting the link to the survey on Vaper's Network. (Page since removed.)

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