Is 2.4 million dollars the reason for the anti-ecigarette campaign?

In case you have missed the story, a scientist has alleged that anti-ecigarette groups have been paid millions by Pfizer.

These are details of just one pharmaceutical group. In the past on this blog we have exposed other payments to politicians and anti-ecig groups, and details of how a politician who sought to ban e-cigs was, according to Open Secrets, paid $128,000 by pharmaceutical companies.

Relevance?

Well, big pharm makes billions from the sale of quit smoking aids (some of which are no more effective than quitting cold turkey.)

Anti-smoking groups drive demand for these products by running quit smoking campaigns, often directly promoting these aids.

But with smokers switching to electronic cigarettes instead of using quit smoking aids, big pharma profits are under threat. (As are government tax revenues!)

Junk Science

While smoking is undoubtedly unhealthy, the smoking debate has been characterised by a slew of junk science.

(Almost as if, once tobacco companies had finally admitted smoking was bad, the field was open for the anti-smoking lobby to claim anything they wanted, no matter how little evidence there was for it.)

With the flood of big pharm money now coming into the anti-ecig campaign, perhaps it's no suprise that this junk science is now being applied to e-cigarettes.

Here's three to be going on with:

1. Stanton Glatz, anti-smoking anti-nicotine fanatic, has alleged that e-cigs contain dangerous chemicals and should not be allowed indoors:

Worrying? Except, as Steve Vape has pointed out, the chemical with the highest concentration had just 2.4% of the maximum level of safe exposure.

2. An allegation highlighted in Dick Puddlecote's blog (with not even a junk science study to back it up) that e-cigarettes could damage non-users via third hand vapour.

Which becomes almost more ridiculous when one considers the third hand smoke conspiracy itself was based on:

• an interview of laypeople on whether they thought third hand smoke might be dangerous
• scraping a lorry drivers cab for tobacco residue, spraying it with acid and then analysing the remains for

Professor Brad Rodu once told us that:

Third hand smoke is an invention by Harvard University anti-tobacco extremists; it consists of “breathing air today in a room or car where people smoked yesterday.”

3. No Evidence that Electronic Cigarettes Can Help Smoker's Quit

America for Non-Smoker's Rights have also claimed that there is no evidence e-cigs can help people quit.

It's true that we need more longer term studies into how effective the electronic cigarette is in helping smokers quit. But it's not true there is no evidence.

Ignoring the anecdotal evidence of 100's of thousands of smokers who have successfully switched, here are three studies in support of ecigs as a cessation aid:

1. 45% of Smoker's Quit With E-Cigs
2. 55% Of Committed Smokers reduce or quit use of cigarettes (Italian Quit Smoking Association Study) (and here's an interview with the author of the study)
3. E-Cigarettes Reduce Nicotine Cravings (Health New Zealand Study)
4. E-Cig Cessation Rates Double Those of Traditional Quit Smoking Aids (Boston University School of Public Health)

Quit or Die Approach: Serious Consquences

As Elaine Keller pointed out in a recent Consumer Advocates for Smoke-free Alternatives Association (CASAA) press release, this junk science approach can have serious consequences.

Considering that:

• Traditional cessation aids have a 93% failure rate.
• E-Cigarettes are up to 99% safer than traditional cigarettes.

This quit or die approach will condemn many, many smokers to an early and unnecessary death.

And all for a miserly $2.4 million dollars.