Scholarships Misrepresented
Scholarships being awarded for tobacco harm reduction essays have been misrepresented by a group of anti-vape researchers as promoting vaping to youth
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by Dave Cross
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“Electronic cigarette companies offer academic scholarships to high school-age teenagers and young adults, showing a disconnect between the industry’s desire to increase vaping among young people and the desire of health advocates to decrease such usage,” writes Goldsmith in the press release accompanying his latest “study”.
“The wide-spread promotion of scholarships from vaping-related companies to young people is concerning for several reasons, including nicotine addiction, potential adverse health impacts, and the epidemic rise in use among youth for the past few years,” said Goldstein. “We know that nicotine in all forms is not good for the developing brains of young people.”
He claims companies are targeting teens and objects to them asking applicants to answer questions like “What are the different types of e-cigarettes and what would you recommend?” and “Why do you think vaping is a safer alternative (to smoking cigarettes)?”
Goldstein’s team searched Google between June to August 2018 and found 21 companies that offering a total of 40 scholarships. They claim these target teens, but their table below shows only one was apparently targeted at non-adults.
Even this is problematic.
Ecigarette Reviewed stated: “We’re interested in your stories and your ideas but you have to support them with current, peer-reviewed research. All entries will be judged on their originality, creativity, and style. Increase your chances of winning by writing a structured, well-referenced essay that coherently approaches the problem.” [link]
It may have been open to applicants 14yrs and older, but it’s hardly ‘promoting’ vaping to youth. Compared to the talent agencies currently recruiting children in California to spout lies to camera on behalf of anti-vape campaigners, Ecigarette Reviewed is simply promoting investigation and science.
It will come as no surprise that Goldstein has been involved with producing anti-vape studies and articles for quite some time and is exceptionally reluctant to admit that vaping offers reduced harm. Examples of his work:
- 2015: Studies Suggest E-cigarettes Don't Aid Long-term Smoking Cessation [link]
- 2016: Successful use of nicotine replacement therapy to quit e‐cigarettes: lack of treatment protocol highlights need for guidelines [link]
- 2017, in “Science for Students”, he ventured his bias in “Concerns explode over new health risks of vaping”: “Goldstein believes that removing flavorings would be one way to discourage kids from experimenting with e-cigs. “Research suggests that if you remove the flavors, far fewer youth around the country would use any tobacco product,” he says. “And that would put fewer kids at risk for vaping-related damage to the mouth and lungs.”
- 2018: UNC professor warns of the path of e-cigarettes to smoking [link]
- 2019: E-cigarette flavors decrease perception of harm among youth [link]
- 2019: Researchers find correlation between vaping cannabis and other tobacco use [link]
Goldstein’s work is just another example of the shoddy ethics held by those who value research funding over evidence, truth and the lives of smokers and ex-smokers.
Related:
- “Vaping industry-funded academic scholarships” by Baler, Paci, Kowitt, and Goldstein – [link]
Photo Credit:
Image by Steve Buissinne from Pixabay
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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