You’ve applied an argument I didn’t make to what I said.
If these are medical devices used to ween off cigarettes, they don’t need to be flavored. The alternative is cigarettes. People aren’t grabbing the next cigarette because they love the strawberry daiquiri flavor. The fact that they are basically all flavored is proof that anti-addiction is not their primary purpose.
I didn’t say they shouldn’t be flavored. I said the flavors are proof of what they are.
Harm reduction should be at the core of any policies around smoking and vaping
What if the outcome of that analysis is that the people being brought off cigarettes are not being outweighed by the people being brought into vaping? That vapes should be prescription medical devices for people who need them and not OTC feelgood drugs? Would you still make the same argument that harm reduction is foremost? I have a feeling you won’t.
There’s a perfectly coherent argument that tobacco trends were heading towards extinction until vaping reignited things. All the trends were heading that way. It was largely dying out as a habit among young people. Vaping completely changed that. It’s now a growing sector that has the potential to last for a long time and damage a lot of people. And we are still only in the early days of seeing how harmful it is – but just like with cigarettes, there’s a huge apparatus pushing out an information campaign that they’re Good Actually and Not Unsafe At All ™.
I don’t think you and I really disagree on any particular policy prescriptions here. I bet we want the same things, and want the same level of honesty brought to the debate. I just think we need to be very clear that the “vapes as useful medical devices” argument does not justify the “vapes being sold abso-fucking-lutely everywhere” result we’re currently getting. They are not popular because they are medical devices. Their usefulness as medical devices isn’t a significant part of the business model.
You’ve applied an argument I didn’t make to what I said.
If these are medical devices used to ween off cigarettes, they don’t need to be flavored. The alternative is cigarettes. People aren’t grabbing the next cigarette because they love the strawberry daiquiri flavor. The fact that they are basically all flavored is proof that anti-addiction is not their primary purpose.
I didn’t say they shouldn’t be flavored. I said the flavors are proof of what they are.
What if the outcome of that analysis is that the people being brought off cigarettes are not being outweighed by the people being brought into vaping? That vapes should be prescription medical devices for people who need them and not OTC feelgood drugs? Would you still make the same argument that harm reduction is foremost? I have a feeling you won’t.
There’s a perfectly coherent argument that tobacco trends were heading towards extinction until vaping reignited things. All the trends were heading that way. It was largely dying out as a habit among young people. Vaping completely changed that. It’s now a growing sector that has the potential to last for a long time and damage a lot of people. And we are still only in the early days of seeing how harmful it is – but just like with cigarettes, there’s a huge apparatus pushing out an information campaign that they’re Good Actually and Not Unsafe At All ™.
I don’t think you and I really disagree on any particular policy prescriptions here. I bet we want the same things, and want the same level of honesty brought to the debate. I just think we need to be very clear that the “vapes as useful medical devices” argument does not justify the “vapes being sold abso-fucking-lutely everywhere” result we’re currently getting. They are not popular because they are medical devices. Their usefulness as medical devices isn’t a significant part of the business model.