Vaping Saved My Life is just ‘industry propaganda’

Vaping Saved My Life is nothing but industry propaganda funded by prominent individuals and entities in the industry to keep vaping from being included in the Tobacco Products and Electronic Delivery Systems Control Bill.

This is according to Dr Catherine Egbe of the South African Medical Research Council. She is a specialist in mental health, alcohol, substance use and tobacco research.

Can vaping save your life? Egbe says the short answer is “no”.  “It is industry propaganda that vaping is safe. This whole story started with the claim vaping is 95% safer than smoking, but that is not true. There is no study that shows vaping is safe,” she says.

She adds that vaping products are not regulated in South Africa, which means there is no control over the import, manufacturing and marketing of these products.

The bill contains new regulations and prohibitions for smoking tobacco as well as electronic cigarettes (vaping).

It aims to regulate the sale and advertising of tobacco products and electronic delivery systems, as well as the packaging, appearance, manufacturing and export. It also seeks to prohibit the sale of these products to children, as well as the free distribution and sales from vending machines.

Spearheading the campaign to convince people and government to exempt vaping from falling under the bill is “consumer advocacy group” Vaping Saved My Life (VSML), that sends out press releases about the benefits of vaping as “an effective harm reduction tool”.

When asked who funds the group, its PR company said it receives funding from multiple sources, particularly those who are interested in vaping as a means of tobacco harm reduction.

Kurt Yeo, the founder of the group, self-funds and also receives funding from the World Vapers’ Alliance, private donations and the Vapour Products Association of South Africa (VPASA), the agency said.

ALSO READ: Tobacco companies hoping new bill won’t deter users from adoption of ‘less harmful’ options

What the vaping industry says

VPASA represents manufacturers, wholesalers and retailers of smoke-free vapour products in South Africa. Asanda Gcoyi, CEO of VPASA, says Egbe misrepresents the scientific position on vaping.

“Neither the industry nor the science claim vaping is safe. Rather, the overwhelming preponderance of scientific evidence is that it is less harmful than tobacco.”

She says the scientific view of the UK’s Royal College of Physicians, the first organisation to definitively find that tobacco was harmful, is vaping may contain only 5% of the harms of smoked tobacco. Therefore, the UK government actively promotes vaping to smokers, while the US Academy of Science also supports this position.

“It is unfortunate that South African public health policy, supported by the MRC, cherry picks unverified claims about the harms of vaping and relies on these to confuse smokers, who desperately need less harmful forms of nicotine consumption … especially when they do not want to quit nicotine altogether.”

ALSO READ: Vaping industry calls on Treasury to stop e-cigarettes tax

What the scientists say about vaping

However, Egbe does not agree and says she could not find the study that was done using empirical evidence to show that vapes only contain 5% of the harms caused by tobacco.

“The UK arrived at their claim of 5% harm without any study done to prove this other than the paper by Nutt and others, while Public Health England received a backlash from the public health community for relying on unscientific claims and pushing such claims to make a decision not backed by science.”

She points out that the World Health Organisation and other credible organisations also do not support this stance and the US has not followed the UK route of recommending smokers use vapes. In 2016, the US Surgeon General declared youth vaping an epidemic.

Egbe explains the claim about vaping being 95% safer than smoking came from a paper based on the opinion of 13 people and did not rely on any empirical evidence or laboratory study of these products. Public Health England’s claim of vaping being 95% safer than smoking, also cited this paper by David Nutt and colleagues published in European Addiction Research.

According to an editorial in The Lancet in 2015, this paper was based on the opinion of a small group of individuals with no pre-specified expertise in tobacco control based on an almost total absence of evidence of harm. In addition, the study was funded by Euroswiss Health and Lega Italiana Anti Fumo (LIAF) and Riccardo Polosa, one of the authors, its chief scientific advisor to LIAF, that also supported his research. Another author was a consultant for manufacturers of products to help people stop smoking.

ALSO READ: Vaping, combined with smoking, just as harmful as cigarette use

A South African study about vaping

“Our South African study involving over 18 000 participants found that after six months e-cigarettes depressed quitting; meaning that those who used e-cigarettes to try to quit were only able to quit for six months at the most and were not able to quit for good. They were also more likely to relapse and the conclusion was that e-cigarette use depressed long-term cessation.”

Egbe says the position of the UK about what they term “tobacco harm reduction” does not allow the free selling of e-cigarettes without regulations.

Electronic cigarettes (with nicotine) are regulated in the UK by the same law which regulates tobacco, while vapes that do not contain nicotine are regulated under a different law – the General Product Safety Regulations.

The only novel products exempted from these laws are medicinally licensed vaping products, but there is presently no medicinally licensed vape product in the UK.

The packaging for vaping liquids is a major problem, she says.

“It looks like these products are marketed to children. If you walk into a vape shop, you will think it is a toy shop. They use cartoon characters and exciting colours. The US FDA already banned online retailers from selling these products that resemble food and toys. You will even find ones resembling teddy bears, school supplies like marker pens or that uses Sponge Bob. And is this marketing to adults?”

ALSO READ: Could vaping be a source of stress for young people?

Does vaping help people to stop smoking?

Egbe says vaping does not help you to stop smoking based on scientific studies.

“In one particular study we conducted here in South Africa with over 18 000 participants, we found vaping only helps them to quit for a short time of around six months. The likelihood that they will fall back to start smoking again was higher for those who were using vapes to stop smoking. We found vaping actually depresses quitting, while those who did quit were also using other pharmaceutical aids to quit.”

Yeo says he believes that vaping is not safe and he agrees teenagers and people who never smoked tobacco should not start vaping. He is also against the marketing of vaping products that makes them look like toys. After swopping vaping for smoking in 2015, he still vapes and says he cannot do without the nicotine.