Recently, Dr. Colin Mendelsohn, a leading Australian general practitioner and anti-smoking researcher, reaffirmed the effectiveness of vape for quitting smoking. As a committed smoker, Dr. Colin has even written a book recommending ways to quit smoking to smokers. In Stop Smoking Start Vaping: The Healthy Truth About Vaping, Dr. Colin mentions that the risk of cancer from smoking is 200 times greater than the risk of cancer from vape use. In addition, in his latest article, Dr. Colin analyzed data and found that in countries that support vape, the quit rate increased by 2 to 3 times and the number of smokers decreased significantly.
Dr Colin believes that Cancer Australia needs to re-evaluate their position and look to the UK and New Zealand health organizations to include vape in all smoking cessation treatments.
At the same time, the Surgeon General launched an initiative to reduce health misinformation, and several U.S. colleges and universities co-authored a paper asking the CDC (Centers for Disease Control and Prevention) to redefine vape and reduce media and public misconceptions about it.
Current public concerns about vape stem from some misinformation from the media and health organizations, and a recent editorial United States Public Health Officials Need To Correct E-cigarette, jointly published by Harvard University, Georgetown University, University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, Penn State University, and others Health Misinformation points out that the CDC (Centers for Disease Control and Prevention) could distinguish nicotine-only vape forms from vape forms containing tetrahydrocannabinol (THC) by issuing a new definition of vape, as only the latter can cause lung damage associated with vape or product use.
The article explains the origin of vape being called EVALI disease, a lung disease that causes serious illness and premature death in many people in North America in 2019-2020. It was originally labeled as “vape-associated lung disease” (VAPI), but “vape” was later added to the title by the CDC and never modified. This further influenced news coverage and led to a distortion of consumer perceptions of nicotine vape risks.
The lack of rigorous definitions of vape nomenclature by professional bodies and some unclear caliber guidelines have led to public confusion about its risks, so this article recommends that the CDC and public health officials re-define vape clearly and acknowledge previous misinformation due to irrational causation and insufficient evidence, which will contribute to long-term public health development.
