Electronic Cigarettes do not start smoking habit

One of the greatest controversies surrounding the electronic cigarette is the concern that it increases the chance that more people will start smoking.

Organisations such as the FDA or Food and Drug Administration in the US say that since electronic cigarettes are advertised as not containing many of the harmful substances contained in tobacco cigarettes, this will entice people to take up a smoking habit when previously there was none.

Dr Adrian Payne said that the device was very unlikely to entice children to start smoking. He is the Managing Director of a Tobacco Harm Reduction Agency and also has over 30 years in post doctoral experience in both the tobacco and pharmaceutical industries.

“In the first place, E-cigarettes are not ‘pocket-money’ devices. Secondly, I don’t think anyone has raised the same concerns about pharmaceutical nicotine inhalators which, in the UK at least, are available over the counter.”

He also mentioned that adults were highly unlikely to take up smoking because of the electronic cigarette.

“I’m not aware of any evidence of adult non-smokers using either E-cigarettes or pharmaceutical nicotine inhalators in any number as a gateway to smoking – if there were I’m sure we would have heard of it by now. Bad news travels fast!”

He was rather supportive of electronic cigarettes saying: “The amount of nicotine inhaled in e-cigarettes is far safer than that of tobacco cigarettes”. During the interview he also covered worries about Propylene glycol, which is the substance used to produce the “smoke” in electronic cigarettes:

“…based on current knowledge, these concerns seem vastly overplayed when compared to the risks of cigarette smoking.”

Dr Payne was alarmed at the proposed Kennedy Tobacco Bill which is due to be reviewed by the US senate soon, stating that they will effectively mean that alternatives to harmful tobacco cigarettes will be made impossible to be approved in the US:

“E-cigarettes are at risk of being caught in a regulatory trap, with consumers being denied the choice of a far safer product than regular cigarettes that might meet their smoking abstinence needs better than either smokeless tobacco or pharmaceutical nicotine products.”