Cigarette smoking is a scourge. Over the last century millions of people have destroyed their lungs, wasted away to nothing, and died horrible deaths. Those who do not die of lung cancer or related diseases suffer from emphysema, chronic obstructive pulmonary disease, loss of lung function, heart disease... the maladies are myriad and well known. I could raise the point that nobody could reasonably believe that inhaling burning plant matter could ever be good for you, and I may at a later time, but the simple fact is that lung cancer is almost exclusively a smoker's disease that causes people to die by the numbers. Anything that reduces the consumption of cigarettes is therefore a good thing.
Unfortunately for us, there is a groundswell of opposition to e-cigarettes. An e-cigarette in its simplest incarnation consists of a battery, an atomizer, and a fluid. The fluid is heated, reduced to a vapor, and the result is inhaled. There is no burning organic plant matter, no smoke is produced, no overtly offensive odors are created. So what's the problem?
The problems are threefold. The first issue is that the e-liquid typically contains nicotine, a highly addictive substance, and the one thing that smokers have the hardest time kicking. Second, the basic e-cigarette that you get from the corner mini-mart looks and functions like a traditional cigarette. Third, non-smokers hold the whip hand. After years of having to endure smokers acting like jerks, lighting up wherever they feel like it and causing their clothes, cars, and everything else to stink, the tables have turned. Now they get to exact revenge on their tormentors.
What they either don't realize, fail to realize, or don't care about is that e-cigarettes are clearly better for everybody involved. The smoker that switches to an e-cigarette no longer inhales 4000 different chemicals. They no longer exhale carcinogenic smoke. They can breathe easier, they don't suffer from smoker's cough, and they regain the ability to exercise for more than a few minutes without passing out from exhaustion due to reduced lung capacity. The ingredients in the e-liquid are vegetable glycerin, propylene glycol, nicotine, and flavoring. Aside from the nicotine, every ingredient is on the FDA's Generally Recognized As Safe list. In the end, what is exhaled is little more than water vapor, a far cry from the bad old days of carcinogenic secondhand smoke.
There are legitimate issues, to be sure. The biggest issue is the availability to children. E-cigarette and e-liquid manufacturers are being accused of marketing to children by creating flavors like Cotton Candy and the like. As I said in a previous blog entry, we put too much stock in doing things "for the children", but in this case it's a good idea. There is no need to create a new generation of drug addicts. This is easily remedied (though not so easily applied) by simply passing a law regulating e-cigarettes as devices for adults only. Second, while nicotine isn't a carcinogen it is still toxic at fairly modest levels, which means that it should be stored and handled with care. In the hands of adults that's not really a big deal.
Instead, we see blanket bans on usage that rival those of tobacco cigarettes. We see them classified as tobacco products, even though there is no tobacco and nothing is burning or emitting smoke. We hear complaints that the scents emitted are offensive, as if the perfume we smell and the car exhaust we breathe aren't just as offensive yet somehow more acceptable. Of course, bans will prevent people from switching, because the short-term effects of smoking aren't particularly dramatic, and so why switch when cigarettes are good enough? Worse yet is the inevitable taxation, which will undoubtedly be punitive in nature as befits a vice. God knows the government doesn't really want people to stop smoking, they're addicted to that sweet, sweet tax money raised on the backs of drug addicts.
We can save lives. We can do it today. If everybody switches tomorrow we
can virtually end lung cancer in an instant. What a gift we have, right in our
hands. This gift will be destroyed at the hands of politicians scrambling for money and overzealous prohibitionists smugly proving their control over you by having e-cigarettes banned. What a tragedy that will be. In the meantime, I will be enjoying the end of my second smoke-free year thanks to e-cigarettes. Were that everybody could enjoy the freedom from the devil weed as I do.
No comments:
Post a Comment