Monday 17 February 2014

An e-cig tale from Bradford Councillor Imran Khan - sometimes I despair

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I was in the local paper being quoted about e-cigs. This followed the awful decision of West Yorkshire Metro to ban vaping on buses and in bus stations. I'd written a letter - here's an excerpt:

Forcing e-cigarette users out into the cold and wet with regular smokers is a stupid idea and one that will merely encourage people to go back to smoking regular – and much more dangerous – cigarettes.

Perhaps Metro and its partners would care to explain how they justify this ban, especially since there is no secondary or sidestream smoke risk and the devices are acting to reduce the users harm from smoking.

I suspect the argument will be as crass as “well it looks like smoking”, which is frankly pathetic. 

This prompted a little article where Bradford Councillor, Imran Hussein, a vaper, said this:

 “I think there’s a big difference between traditional smoking and vaping. If there wasn’t, there would be no need for me to use an e-cigarette. But it’s a matter of public perception.

“I think the sight of adults vaping could encourage children to try cigarettes. If they see vaping as not harmful, it could be the first step to smoking.”

The man is an idiot - doesn't he realise that it's the very similarity with smoking that makes vaping work? And am I the only one who finds the who "it looks like smoking, it must be bad" argument a little tiresome? There is precisely no evidence to suggest that e-cigs are dangerous to health but the BMA and others among the health fascists persist in pretending that somehow these things are scary.

E-cigs are saving lives. This is really all you need to know about them. Millions of people have switched from lethal cigarettes to take up vaping. And that's millions of people less likely to be in the lung cancer and heart attack queue. Isn't that what we want?

Sometimes I despair

Update: The eagle-eyed will spot I made an error - got the wrong Imran! The Council Deputy Leader is a vaper (so an easy mistake) and is called Imran. Nothing much to add except 'oops sorry'!

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3 comments:

GolfKahn said...

The Age of Idiocy shows no signs of abatement!

cigarbabe said...

I am absolutely appalled that the person who uttered this nonsensical bullshit claims to be a vaper!?!
Has he learned nothing?
Shame on you Imran Hussein!
You may as well join the ANTZ extremist who spout the same lies.
C.B.

Linda & Rob Reid said...

It's a shame that something so lifesaving can be the cause of such horror to people, start propaganda campaigns, taunt people who have quit the habit of smoking into believing that what they are doing is bad. The truth is someone somewhere is losing out big time in the cash department and mud slinging works, coming up with crazy ideas works, facts aren't accounted for. Common sense has to be used where electronic cigarettes are concerned. It's enabling people to quit, and as there is no smell or passive smoke which comes from vaping an e-cig, it's highly unlikely that a child will want to even consider smoking a cigarette by the use of an electronic cigarette. About 80% of all e-cigs don't look anything like cigarettes, but when this argument is done and dusted with, the propaganda makers will come up with another excuse to either ban or over-regulate this one of the most fantastic devices I've ever used in my 53 years on this planet and a device which could see the complete demise of the killer tobacco cigarette by the end of this century.