Second-Best Dentist Slates Vaping
England’s second-best dentist in 2010 has decided that attacking tobacco harm reduction is a good use of his time
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by Dave Cross
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In 2009, the practice picked up Dentistry Awards’ Best Website. It is unknown whether he awarded himself this accolade, but he does proudly state he was a member of the judging panel. The award-winning website that currently promises, “A diverse programme of courses, training and study clubs will soon be announced for 2016” - in 2022.
Attention to detail is also missing when it comes to tobacco harm reduction. In August, obscurely writing for a Chinese news site, Parmar announces: “Vaping is smoking”. It’s a rather an odd statement considering he claims he “is famed for his attention to detail” on his personal blog.
Citing information he has gleaned from the United States, he poses a supposedly rhetorical question, asking: “Often used as a quitting method to smoking cigarettes, vaping is even recommended as an alternative by Public Health England (PHE). But have they got it wrong?”
“[Vaping is] causing another health crisis,” he says, pointing to 2019’s EVALI lung outbreak in the USA. So, happy to cite anti-tobacco harm reduction tripe from America’s National Institute on Drug Abuse but seemingly unable to read the EVALI position statement on the USA’s Centres for Disease Control’s website.
“Vaping … has become commonplace, particularly among the youth,” he continues. Planet of the Vapes would kindly suggest Dr Parmar reads “Use of e-cigarettes among young people in Great Britain, 2021”, produced by Action on Smoking and Health and Cancer Research UK.
Then he made up something he calls “vaping-related pneumonia” before continuing with a stream of ridiculous nonsense that could have been penned by a laissez-faire Bloomberg-funded PR lacky after a boozy office party.
Which brings us to last week’s article he submitted to CommentCentral, where he argues in the third person “that the health service shouldn't be wasting resources on smoking alternatives, and the burden should fall upon smokers themselves.”
“The NHS has recently announced it will be dishing out vaping 'starter packs' to aid people in giving up smoking,” Parmar states.
Except it didn’t and the NHS isn’t. The project, as anybody who is famed for their attention to detail would know, is a trial being led by researchers at the University of East Anglia and funded by the National Institute for Health Research. We wrote about it last May, if you fancy a read Dr Parmar.
“I find it bizarre that instead of increasing nurses wages or creating more ICU units, the NHS has opted to facilitate the nation's nicotine habit,” he says.
Planet of the Vapes can’t promise it will be awarding a Second-Worst Harm Reduction Related Comments award in 2022, but if we do then Nilesh Parmar is definitely in the running. Especially if we can get him to sit on the judging panel.
Photo Credit:
Photo by Jonathan Borba on Unsplash
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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