Health Groups Continue to Spread False and Misleading Information about Electronic Cigarettes

The volume of misleading information being put out by health groups regarding electronic cigarettes is becoming so high that I cannot stick to just one example at a time. Today, I have to triple up in order to include recent examples.

1. According to comments submitted by the Boston Public Health Commission to the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) in response to its proposal to ban smoking in multi-unit public housing, smoking may be no more hazardous than vaping. The Public Health Commission urged HUD to include electronic cigarettes in its ban, imploring the agency "not to assume that they are any less hazardous to health than traditional tobacco products."

2. According to the American Lung Association of West Virginia, there is no evidence that smoking is any more hazardous than vaping. An article in the Charleston Gazette-Mail quotes the ALA as stating: "There’s no research that shows e-cigarettes are safer than traditional tobacco products."

3. According to the research director of the Department of Emergency Medicine at University of Iowa Healthcare, the nicotine levels present in electronic cigarette aerosol have been shown to contribute to cardiovascular disease. In a letter to the editor of the Des Moines Register, he writes: "E-cigarettes ... include dangerous organic solvents from the purification process and the nicotine levels present have been shown to contribute to cardiovascular disease."

The Rest of the Story

There is no scientific question that vaping is much safer than smoking. No reputable scientist disputes this. Even Stan Glantz acknowledges that vaping is substantially safer than smoking. Thus, the Boston Public Health Commission and the American Lung Association of West Virginia are spreading false information about e-cigarettes.

Although nicotine does have cardiovascular effects, it has not been shown to cause cardiovascular disease. It is unclear whether nicotine alone causes cardiovascular disease. Most likely, the cardiovascular disease associated with cigarette smoking is a result of many other chemicals and nicotine alone is not sufficient to induce cardiovascular disease. Thus, the nicotine levels present in electronic cigarette aerosol have not been shown to contribute to cardiovascular disease. This statement out of University of Iowa Healthcare is very misleading, if not outright false.

It is uncanny that health groups are spreading so much misinformation about electronic cigarettes. I have never before observed a health issue about which so many health groups were spreading so much false and misleading information. This is such a unique situation that it almost defies explanation. There must be a such a deep hatred of electronic cigarettes, spurred by a severe perceived threat posed by these products, in order to bring out these repeated stories of deceptive communications by health organizations regarding e-cigarettes. The threat, I believe, is that something which looks like smoking could possibly be a good thing. Health groups simply cannot handle that.