Blatant Mistruths and Spin

This guy

 (487 twitter followers) is one of the worst examples of a supposed educated man with a constant gripe against e-cigs . I have read his posts previously, ultimately deciding to unfollow him as he simply puts out propaganda on an epic scale, and as is usual, refuses to engage.

Two recent posts were highlighted by others and curiosity got the better of me

If the 2 links are not clear for you I will highlight what they lead to here http://www.atsjournals.org/doi/abs/10.1164/rccm.201505-0898ED?journalCode=ajrccm#.Vb1P2W5Vikp

and http://www.atsjournals.org/doi/abs/10.1164/rccm.201505-0915ED?journalCode=ajrccm#.Vb1QCG5Vikp

Both of these 'extracts' demonstrate what is  produced  ad nauseum from supposedly learned but misguided people. Just a cursory glance very quickly confirms that these are not in any way balanced, scientific pieces of work rather a hysterical,scaremongering piece of  opinionated garbage, more akin to the gutter press. Scepticism is acceptable but blatant agenda driven drivel is certainly not,I wonder how many of the commentators are expert in the field of smoking cessation? Or indeed any field that could add anything much of use to the ongoing 'debate', that every man and his dog has decided to pass an opinion on, usually with negligible knowledge.

An excellent article by Lindsay Fox summarises ''How to Write a Bullshit Anti-Vaping Article'' http://ecigarettereviewed.com/how-to-write-a-bullshit-anti-vaping-article this undoubtedly could be extended to include the blatantly biased studies and attendant hyped up press releases that are unquestioningly published around the World by the syndicated press.

Stanbrook has the gall to say ''Don't be fooled by #ecigarette 'proponents' spin ''   Hah!

How can this guy just blatantly ignore independent surveys conducted Worldwide that UNIVERSALLY state that the number of non-smoking teens regularly using e-cigs is of the order of <2% and substantially less in many .

 Professor Linda Bauld confirms here http://vaping.com/ecigsummit2014/linda-bauld

 ASH UK statistics http://www.ash.org.uk/files/documents/ASH_891.pdf

Cancer Research UK http://www.cancerresearchuk.org/about-us/cancer-news/press-release/2015-06-12-research-shows-most-children-do-not-regularly-use-e-cigarettes

ONS (Office for National Statistics) http://www.theguardian.com/news/datablog/2014/nov/25/e-cigarettes-not-gateway-traditional-smoking-great-britain?CMP=share_btn_tw

Many similar links could be provided for the individual States in the US demonstrating negligible numbers of non-smoking youth taking up e-cigarettes on a regular basis.

This article from Brad Rodu highlights part of the deception that seems rife when discussing numbers http://rodutobaccotruth.blogspot.co.uk/2014/04/nejm-fails-to-correct-data-on-childrens.html

The other article Stanbrook highlighted was calling for for more data - I'm surprised he didn't call for clinical trials! Oh wait .......US seems to put impossible hurdles there!! see esp P2 http://www.forbes.com/sites/sallysatel/2015/07/30/double-standard-for-e-cigarettes-v-medical-marijuana/

Once again an outbreak of hysteria, there is more than enough existing data for any reasonable person or medic to conclude that some unknowns still exist, but that e-cigarettes are undoubtedly a  substantially safer option than the alternative. For a good list of current studies see http://blog.rursus.de/studienliste/

For further confirmation of how pragmatic Health Professionals feel, I encourage the reader to examine M.O.V.E. http://moveorganization.org/move/ and try to encourage further involvement with their own acquaintances or indeed anyone else to extend into more countries and numbers

Finally I will leave the last words to Kevin ......... Who has tirelessly worked to produce both a Consumers Survey https://vapinglinks.wordpress.com/2015/06/22/the-vaping-truth-survey-is-now-live/   and a Health Pro Survey here https://vapinglinks.wordpress.com/2015/05/28/health-care-professionals-and-e-cigarettes-survey/

Read this excellent blog from him describing the early results of the Health Pro Survey https://vapinglinks.wordpress.com/2015/07/31/medical-professionals-say-what-about-e-cigarettes/

To conclude, thankfully there are many in the medical profession who are far more open minded than the likes of Stanbrook who appears to have set himself on a mission to become a wannabe 'Stan'(from UCLA)

****** Updated following horrific propaganda and spin at #ATS2016 Wednesday 18th May

this poster was the prelude to a series of manic tweets that featured a co-author of Stanbrook in his latest so called research with an  abstract of the ATS presentation here  

 

I suggest a look through Sean Spence (co-author) tweets on this date are called for look here  Again the point I made above are these the acts of dispassionate rational scientists/medics? I really doubt it!

The agenda is perfectly clear to my mind 

An unashamed plug for Daily News in vapers.org.uk

Firstly I must state a conflict of interest, I along with a number of others (12 currently) voluntarily find news articles ,research papers and blogs of interest ,these are then assembled,curated and published by the mysterious editor.

The idea originated in October 2014 with the first Daily News published in November, this is put out on the website http://vapers.org.uk/, Facebook https://www.facebook.com/vapers.org.uk and Twitter https://twitter.com/vapersorguk

Obviously I am slightly biased, but the content and presentation would lead me to suggest this is the leading daily resource, especially for busy people who cannot spend all day trawling through a multitude of Facebook posts. Twitter used to be a very good resource especially when it had the 'Discovery' feature,but sadly this has now been removed.

If you have never tried the Daily News give it a go and register your appreciation with twitter and Facebook likes (500 just achieved btw) , the other alternative is to receive your Daily News by e-mail

to find the above,simply click http://vapers.org.uk/category/latest-news/ to find the subscription information on the right hand side of the page

If you do have interesting blogs or news articles not covered that you feel would be of general interest contact vapers.org.uk through any of the above avenues mentioned earlier .

Happy Reading

Evolving Nicotine Usage and Consequences

I must state from the outset that my conversion from ciggies began in February 2013 on a nicotine level of 24 mg/ml and  continues at the same strength to this day. All advice given in those early days from any respected source (forums) stressed that at least 18mg/ml or higher was required for a successful transition

Expert advice from Professor  Bernd Mayer expresses this in great detail here   another interesting blog covers aspects here by Norbert Zillatron https://nzillatron.wordpress.com/2014/11/01/dimishing-dependency/ 

There does however seem to have been a massive change in nicotine strength usage and patterns over the last 12 months which can be attributed to a number of factors 

These results have been obtained by kind permission from Kevin Crowley whose excellent ongoing survey I highly recommend everyone to take part (note current info relates to ~2700 persons) in https://vapinglinks.wordpress.com/2015/06/22/the-vaping-truth-survey-is-now-live/

The above shows a vast amount of information but the most remarkable is the massive change in user nicotine strengths.

Liquid manufacturers and vendors statistics confirm this is happening(sales data) , its not as a result of  panic over impending draconian and illogical regulation this is a consumer led evolution .

Or is it ? read Paul Barnes excellent blog http://fdm.ukvaping.com/2015/07/what-are-we-fighting-for/ are vendors and manufacturers driving the, or reacting to, consumer demand? 

( I am sounding like this guy now https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SvfTa_B3hGA so will promptly shut up)!

So maybe its the rapid evolution of the products that researchers such as Ann McNeil have noticed and done preliminary studies http://www.kcl.ac.uk/ioppn/news/records/2015/April/New-e-cigarette-research-on-type-and-frequency-of-use.aspx  BUT this omits that devices have  further evolved,  to be far more efficient at delivering satisfying results via reduced nicotine concentration liquids,This highlights the problem for researchers, struggling to produce current real world data in a rapidly evolving market.

The next two results show this dramatic shift in the users choices of devices 

So what are the consequences ?

1) Probable increased usage of e-liquid in the latest high-end devices(high wattage possibly temperature controlled) with 'sub-ohm' tanks, using a low nicotine concentration content, as users self titrate, probably to the identical total of daily nicotine used(guesstimate). This in itself should not be especially harmful but just may increase the possibility.

2) Advice to new switchers is a very important and  a problematic area, should folks give advice as in the opening paragraph ie relatively simple devices that require high nicotine concentrations, but becoming  increasingly unavailable and will be regulated via the TPD to 20mg/ml (barely enough to satisfy new switchers)

Alternative advice could be to suggest the latest high powered devices and tanks but this avenue has many potential pitfalls.

3) Kevin's survey (below) shows 25% of consumers who either currently or could mix their own liquids, this has increased enormously over the last few years as the numbers of experienced users has multiplied. 

May 2016 in the EU will see the TPD introduced with mixing supplies under direct threat regarding  bottle size restrictions and usable strengths. Obviously the survey throws up many other unintended consequences, the most disturbing for regulators should be the first two on the list, especially 'Will go to the black market'.

4)Regulators,advisers and their researchers appear ill informed in many aspects eg market share http://alanbeard.blogspot.co.uk/2015/06/e-cigarette-market-myths.html current,factual 

 information is required to aid their comprehension of smoking harm reduction. However, opportunities can be totally overlooked,due to misinformation,poor advice and possibly hostile external influence. For an eloquent plea to her own legislators read http://www.scoop.co.nz/stories/GE1507/S00032/is-nz-ready-for-consumer-driven-quit-smoking-programmes.htm this summary from Professor Glover  

Breaking Out #1

These are just a few rambly thoughts put down more for me to refer to,but may provoke others to add and refine in a far more eloquent manner

Vaping advocacy involves getting across truthful messages,education and information about campaigns, but we have had very limited success so far in this. This is not a criticism,simply a statement of fact,that the 'message' is only heard by relatively tiny numbers of devotees inotherwords 'preaching to the converted'

Without me ranting about Vaping  Facebook groups and Forums that have little interest in such matters(some rare exceptions)  it brings me to other options that need exploration

Following a series of twitter exchanges with friends it led me to thinking about something we all have probably considered, maybe tried,maybe failed. As a forerunner to me trying and obviously succeeding with my conversion to e-cigs I used to spend long hours on a pedelec(electric bike) forum

Lo and behold I stumbled across this month old thread (at that time) http://www.pedelecs.co.uk/forum/threads/electronic-cigarettes.13501/ as a heavy smoker @40/day over a 45 year period I was inspired by the thought process and experiences charted by the author and inspiration for the blog @neptune  and swiftly joined a forum (http://allaboute-cigarettes.proboards.com/ and received some great buying advice - needless to say it worked! Can I add that the pedelec forum thread is the longest running most popular thread on an Electric Bike Forum.

this was started in pedelecs in an 'off-topic' chat section , Similarly but with less success I started something similar in another pastime http://www.motorhomefun.co.uk/portal/

*updated* @balbecdaze (Liam) put forward this as another eg
http://www.mumsnet.com/Talk/am_i_being_unreasonable/1912752-AIBU-to-STILL-feel-positively-evangelical-about-electronic-cigarettes-thread-2

We all have pastimes !! that we may belong to on forums - have they got an off-topic section?

Another very obvious way is to write factual replies in newspaper articles and journals,avoiding angry ranting if at all possible - they are great free opportunities to further our messages

These are very simplistic ways of trying to spread the message 'outside of the box' ....we need very many more ......to be continued

Apathetic, Broke or Ignorance

There has been a number of calls for collections of money in recent times to assist various campaigns, an ill-fated e-cigssavelives campaign in 2013 , 2 crowdfunders for Dr Farsalinos in 2013 and 2014, Dodo-Boxes for the Efvi campaign 2014 and NOW donations to a political party that has pledged to use the money to help to gain signatures in Wales https://ldwales.nationbuilder.com/ecigs_donate

One thing that has always struck me throughout each of these campaigns is the relative difficulty in getting the required totals achieved

Consumers

Apathy   - how many know about these campaigns who just ignore them? 'seen it all before' , 'nowt to do with me' , 'why should I bother' , 'its scaremongering', 'not going to happen'. Forums and Facebook pages abound with chat about new devices,swaps,coil builds etc  but getting involvement in advocacy/petitions/collections is so bloody difficult. Some actively make this difficult (5th columnists - luckily few of those, but they do exist!) by hi-jacking and poisoning the purpose of the thread. I simply ask these people a question is it all about YOU?  maybe it should be about giving smokers the same opportunity that we have enjoyed. YOU may be able to manage in the future,but what about the millions of smokers who will not have ready access to products or even forums?

Broke - Undoubtedly times have been hard in recent years, but even a modest token donation of £1 boosts the totals and indicates both moral and financial support. A single  10ml bottle of bought liquid £3-£6! - could that money have been donated if you thought about it?

Ignorance- Many excellent resources exist , there is no excuse to be in the dark!
eg
 http://nicotinepolicy.net/
http://gfn.net.co/2014
http://www.ecigarette-politics.com/
http://www.clivebates.com/
http://vapers.org.uk/
http://www.vapourtrails.tv
http://www.ecigarette-research.org/research/index.php
this represents a tiny amount of excellent quality resources
join http://nnalliance.org/ as a supporter(free)

Another feature that is perplexing to me and really the purpose of this blog

Vendors 

Firstly, let me state categorically this is not directed at all vendors but, and a very big BUT at way too many 

WHY

1) No donations from you towards fundraising ?
2) Why not informing customers properly about important campaigns with newsletters,mailshots,Fb + Twitter entries?
3) Why not actively campaigning as above- Is anything on your website about ANY campaign ?
4) Why is activism in general ignored by you ?

graphic courtesy of @VaEHp  who points out what you already know, its the will to do it that's sadly lacking!

I have heard many moans from the dedicated consumer activists about this irresponsible, incomprehensible lack of feckin interest from vendors who seemingly don't care a jot, why should they be left to fight OUR battle alone?

Now is the time to MAN up not just STOCK up - because that will be a distant memory unless you get involved NOW

just as a reminder ,even though you shouldn't need it read Dave Kitson's excellent blog http://wp.thehappyvaper.com/?p=874

btw an important update from Totally Wicked - downloadable support forms for vendors + consumers http://article20legalchallenge.com/support-the-legal-challenge/

Why isn't Totally Wicked receiving more support?

Firstly, let me state I don't happen to use Totally Wicked products so have no conflict of interests

The TPD especially Article 20 has dire consequences for users, vendors,manufacturers of what is undoubtedly the most popular method worldwide of Tobacco Harm Reduction ie the bloody things work for a vast number of people and THIS is THREATENED

Without a definitive and  long winded history of  opposition towards the TPD, two campaigns have received modest support from the general public

EFVI  http://www.efvi.eu/  which although now complete received 185,000 signatures (the totals continue after the expiry date) . From an estimated 10 million users across the EU this was disappointing.

Totally Wicked http://article20legalchallenge.com/challenge/

These figures imply that  many of our European neighbours have either ignored this or considered it a UK only initiative with zero relevance to them . 

Surely,in the absence of anything else to challenge the TPD WE all should be  actively supporting the actions of Totally Wicked . 33,437 signatures of support (taking 5 secs) is mediocre at best . Let them walk into the courtroom with a minimum of 100,000 signatures of support to strengthen their argument . 

Who else is mounting a  very costly legal challenge from any direction?now is the time to put  commercial expoitation fears and any past bad feelings (whether justified or not) towards TW aside.

Fatilistic or 'bury the head in the sand' approaches are not required - get supporting! 

 ps..  If you are still dubious, please read this excellent blog http://fdm.ukvaping.com/2015/04/why-we-should-support/ that is very persuasive 

Where Half truths misinform

This is my starting point, the above comes from the Explanatory Memorandum justifying the Welsh Government proposed Bill to ban the use of e-cigarettes from all enclosed spaces  http://www.assembly.wales/laid%20documents/pri-ld10224-em/pri-ld10224-em-e.pdf  , I will highlight the 3 linked sources contained 

197:- http://www.thinkspain.com/news-spain/24345/e-cigarette-sales-in-spain-drop-by-70-per-cent

198:- http://www.abacoadvisers.com/spain_explained/blog/spanish-law/e-cigarette-legislation-spain 

199:- http://ecigintelligence.com/

The last of the 3 links provided in the justification could be described as literally misleading (199)

The factors mentioned in the document ie over- saturation and age of sale restriction may well have played a part in the dramatic reduction of the e-cigarette market but ignores the role of a relentless negative campaign towards e-cigs that exists in Spain mirrored in the media.

One particularly high profile lipoid pneumonia scare story attracted enormous press attention, and even though the offending doctor was successfully challenged in court that was not deemed newsworthy. Two excellent blogs explain this in far more detail http://www.e-volutas.com/2014/01/expediente-l-la-falsa-neumonia-lipoidea.html , http://vaporyciencia.com/sobre-el-glicerol-y-la-pretendida-neumonia-lipoidea/

The afor mentioned ecigintelligence eludes to this here http://ecigintelligence.com/a-tale-of-two-tank-markets-success-in-u-s-woes-in-spain/

Propaganda is clearly rife in Spain, the observation that 'repeat a lie often enough until it becomes the truth' seems very appropriate here, and by implication the Welsh Government who cherry picked its 'evidence' to justify its proposals

The real scale of the reduction in e-cigarette use in Spain is a 90% reduction in retailers and 80% of consumers since early 2014, this is an unfolding tragedy of monumental proportion.

Yet the WHO on advice from local tobacco controllers estimate an 8% reduction in smoking rates from 29-21% in the upcoming 10 years http://apps.who.int/iris/bitstream/10665/156262/1/9789241564922_eng.pdf?ua=1, without THR products this seems an overly optimistic estimate.

Once again I encourage readers to visit here  http://jester-midnightmusings.blogspot.co.uk/2015/06/hscc-issues-call-for-evidence.html,which is an excellent explanatory blog from Simon Thurlow for actions that Vendors and Consumers should read and act upon.