The evidence keeps piling up: e-cigarettes are definitely safer than smoking

The evidence keeps piling up: e-cigarettes are definitely safer than smoking
Search for the term ‘Vape Wholesale’ online and you’d be forgiven for thinking that it is an activity
fraught with risks. The top stories relate to health problems,
explosions and that vaping leads to smoking in teenagers. For the
average smoker seeking information on vaping, a quick internet search
offers little reassurance. Might as well continue smoking, the headlines
imply, if these products are so dangerous.

But the reality is that they are not. In the past year, more than any other, the evidence that using an e-cigarette is far safer than
smoking has continued to accumulate. 2017 saw the publication of the
first longer term study of vaping, comparing toxicant exposure between
people who’d stopped smoking and used the products for an average of 16
months, compared with those who continued to smoke. Funded by Cancer
Research UK, the study found large reductions in carcinogens and other
toxic compounds in vapers compared with smokers, but only if the user
had stopped smoking completely. A further recent study compared
toxicants in vapour and smoke that can cause cancer, and estimated
excess cancer risk over a lifetime from smoking cigarettes or vaping.
Most of the available data on e-cigarettes in this study suggested a
cancer risk from vaping around 1% of that from smoking.

E-cigarettes are less harmful than smoking because they don’t contain tobacco. Inhaling burnt tobacco - but also chewing it - is
hugely damaging to human health. Remove the tobacco and the combustion
and it is hardly surprising that risk is reduced. That doesn’t mean
e-cigarettes are harmless. But it does mean that we can be relatively
confident that switching from smoking to vaping will have health
benefits.

These new studies and others have influenced policy, at least in the UK. In England, a broad consensus endorsed by many health organisations
has existed since 2016 encouraging smokers to try vaping. This year
additional organisations, like the Royal College of General
Practitioners and the British Medical Association issued new reports
also pointing to e-cigarettes as a positive choice for smokers trying to
quit. And for the first time, Public Health England included
e-cigarettes in its advertising for ‘Stoptober’ an annual stop smoking
campaign. In Scotland, a large number of organisations led by Health
Scotland issued a statement making clear that vaping is definitely safer
than smoking that was also supported by Scotland’s Chief Medical
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