September 5th, 2018

Letter to WHO's DG against prohibition and for risk-proportionate regulation

Mike Bloomberg and the WHO DG  launching the Bloomberg-funded report on the Global Tobacco Epidemic 2017. An unsurfaced conflict of interest?

We’ve sent a letter to WHO and the FCTC secretariat in advance of FCTC COP-8 (1-6 October, Geneva) – protesting about WHO’s inclination towards prohibition and excessive regulation of alternative nicotine delivery systems (ANDS).  For background, see papers on vaping (FCTC/COP/8/10) and heated tobacco products and others (FCTC/COP/8/8).

The letter by David Abrams, Ray Niaura, David Sweanor and me is available in PDF form with all footnotes here – and the text is reproduced without notes below. >> read the full post

Category: WHO | One comment
September 5th, 2018

Innovation for Consumers: E-cigarettes and novel tobacco products – Part of the problem or part of the solution?

My presentation slides to a meeting in the European Parliament organised by Monika Beňová MEP…

Category: Uncategorized | 5 comments
August 8th, 2018

South Africa draft tobacco Bill - protects cigarette trade and denies smokers options to quit

South Africa smoking prevalence – Tobacco Atlas

Source: South Africa Factsheet – Tobacco Atlas

David Abrams, Ray Niaura, David Sweanor and I have submitted comments on the draft tobacco and vaping legislation under discussion in South Africa. South Africa is always influential in low and middle income countries, especially in Africas, and is always an important player in WHO meetings.

The draft legislation is almost completely disproportionate in its approach to tobacco harm reduction technologies. It mostly treats reduced-risk products as though they are the same as smoking products. The alternative philosophy, which we advocate, is to adopt ‘risk proportionate regulation’ that encourages (or rather, does not inhibit) smokers from using vaping, novel nicotine products, heated tobacco or smokeless tobacco products to quit smoking.

Our full 20-page submission is here.

The short summary is reproduced below. >> read the full post

Category: Countries, Law, Uncategorized | 4 comments
May 1st, 2018

The urge to ban: 10 questions to ask first

Clive Bates from The E-Cigarette Summit U.S. 2018

My presentation from the E-cigarette Summit (US) 30 April 2018 – video (top) and PowerPoint slides (below).

>> read the full post

Category: Adolescents, FDA, Nicotine | One comment
April 9th, 2018

The US media is losing its mind over vaping and Juul - the questions a credible journalist should ask

Losing perspective?

Update 30 April 2018 – JUUL: hold the moral panic

Introducing a modern moral panic

Over the weekend in an aside in my long blog about the sophistry of anti-vaping activists,  I mentioned the unfolding moral panic about vaping and, especially, Juul e-cigarettes among teens (see the quote from the blog below for background). I want to add to this with some views on appropriate journalistic inquiry and suggest a line of sceptical questioning a credible journalist could use.   >> read the full post

Category: Adolescents, Antis, FDA, Science | 20 comments
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