VBI Addresses Potential Bans
John Dunne addressed The All-Party Committee on Health about vaping, tobacco harm reduction, and legislation in Ireland
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by Dave Cross
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“We need to ban underage sales while ensuring that adult smokers have access to an alternative that works,” John told the meeting. It comes as the Irish government is considering banning all sales to people under 21.
The Royal College of Physicians in Ireland (RCPI) already argued for a comprehensive ban on sales and flavours to an Oireachtas Committee.
The All-Party Committee on Health’s evidence gathering exercise comes in the lead up to the Public Health (Tobacco and Nicotine Inhaling Products) Bill.
Respect Vapers represents Irish vapers who chose vaping to help them quit smoking. They said: “Fair play to John Dunne for pointing out the need for politicians to base their decisions on large-scale studies, rather than tiny ones.”
John Dunne said: “We would like to acknowledge and commend members of the committee for the work undertaken on this important legislation at the pre-legislative scrutiny stage. We very much welcome the opportunity to represent the 200,000 people who use v aping products around the country, and the 300+ retailers and newsagents who each day are responsible for guiding, supporting, and advising adult smokers in their communities to help achieve a tobacco-free Ireland.
“In 2013, the Department of Health set an ambitious goal for Tobacco-free Ireland by 2025, aiming to achieve a smoking prevalence rate of 5% or lower. Now, despite the efforts of many, the HSE recognised [in its 2018 report] that this goal will not be achieved until 2052.”
John went on to point out that the smoking rate has actually increased and now languishes at 18%, highlighting how “we are nowhere near reaching the goal”.
“Clearly to get us back on the path to achieving this goal we need a new approach – and vaping should be a central component within that.”
“Vaping has a vital place in the equation,” John continued. “Indeed, the 2019 Healthy Ireland survey showed almost four times as many successful quit attempts were attributed to vaping – while 10% who successfully quit used NRT, 38% used vaping.”
John repeated that the written submission to the committee contained a wealth of expert-driven evidence to demonstrate that vaping is considerably less risky than smoking.
“The most important of those was the 2015 Public Health England evidence review which was carried out by experts from Kings College London and Queens University of London, which showed that vaping products were around 95% less harmful than smoking.
“Now Public Health England has consistently maintained this position in its annual evidence updates and their findings have been backed by key public health experts and groups, including the Royal College of Physicians and leading anti-tobacco NGOs such as Action for Smoking and Health (ASH) and Cancer Research UK (CRUK).”
John went on to address the value of flavours, the need for sensible marketing regulations, and the importance of maintaining accessibility for adults for whom vaping has demonstrably worked and can work for current smokers.
References:
- John Dunne’s presentation - https://twitter.com/i/broadcasts/1kvJpAdDzMDxE
Dave Cross
Journalist at POTVDave is a freelance writer; with articles on music, motorbikes, football, pop-science, vaping and tobacco harm reduction in Sounds, Melody Maker, UBG, AWoL, Bike, When Saturday Comes, Vape News Magazine, and syndicated across the Johnston Press group. He was published in an anthology of “Greatest Football Writing”, but still believes this was a mistake. Dave contributes sketches to comedy shows and used to co-host a radio sketch show. He’s worked with numerous start-ups to develop content for their websites.
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