Industry organisation the Independent British Vape Trade Association (IBVTA) has launched a national campaign “to clear the air” about vaping. It has grown concerned about misinformation sowing confusion in smokers and the wider public and hopes that its six-month drive will “clear the air of confusion” by highlighting the “research that underlines the importance of vaping in helping smokers to quit.”
Bad news feeds negative opinions
“Recent months have seen a flurry of negative headlines about vaping and, according to research from a leading health charity, 40% of people now believe vaping is as or more harmful than smoking, a figure that has risen by an astonishing 60% in just three years,” says IBVTA.
Just last month, Action on Smoking and Health was pleading with media organisations to act in a more responsible manner when covering news stories about vaping. The anti-smoking charity says that misinformation and scare stories have been a major contribution to the rise in people wrongly believing that ecigs as or more harmful than cigarettes.
Action on Smoking and Health issues a full breakdown of the problem in its document “Addressing common myths about vaping – Putting the evidence in context”.
Experts were swift to get behind the document’s release. King’s College London’s Dr Leonie Brose said the rise in misunderstand was “concerning as it will make them less likely to try what we know is an effective way of stopping smoking.”
Queen Mary University’s Professor Hajek said that the level of misinformation in media coverage about health risks “is alarming”.
University College London’s Dr Sharon Cox said: “The evidence on vaping for smoking cessation is clear and strong…this trend [of papers conveying fear instead of facts] needs to be stopped and reversed.”
For this reason, IBVTA, an organisation representing the independent UK vape industry, says it is “aiming to set the record straight, highlighting the benefits of vaping, how vaping devices are being used to help smokers quit and how vaping is crucial to the Government’s ambition to make the UK smoke free by 2030.”
It’s not just smokers
The problem with the misinformation in the media is that not only has media coverage misled current smokers, but it has also helped in shifting opinion in the Houses of Parliament.
Helen Hayes MP recently introduced her Ten-Minute Rule Bill to introduce restrictions on how the industry can brand, promote and explain the benefits of vape products. The Bill sailed through its First Reading, having garnered cross-party support for a clampdown right at the time smokers need more h9onest information about the revolutionary reduced harm products.
Hayes’ Bill was preceded by Dr Caroline Johnson’s Ten-Minute Rule Bill seeking to eliminate all disposable vapes from sale in the UK. Despite not lending official support to the Conservative MP, the government has since intimated that it might be willing to eliminate disposable ecigs from the English market. The evidence hasn’t changed, only public opinion on the back of a concerted effort to sway it through newspaper coverage.
The evidence hasn’t changed
The Royal College of Paediatrics and Child Health and the Local Government Association were the main bodies pushing the government to change its longstanding support for vaping, leading to a Department of Health spokesperson saying it needed to act to protect young people from taking up vaping.
The problem is they justify this volte-face because of findings from a recent Action on Smoking and Health report looking at teen use. But the charity was one of the loudest to say that a complete ban was the worst possible move for public health: “The risk of unintended consequences is too great for us to support a ban”.
Consumer charity the New Nicotine Alliance added: “The convenience and wide choice of flavours are useful for helping smokers to switch to a safer product, especially amongst heavier smokers and disadvantaged and vulnerable groups. Disposable vapes don’t require refilling and recharging, so are easier to use. People who have problems with dexterity find them very useful and their low cost and convenience helps to prevent relapse to smoking.”
Academics and the industry all warned that a ban would lead to growth in the unregulated black market and serve to confirm to smokers that there must be an element of danger to vaping – further entrenching their smoking habits.
Even the Daily Telegraph, itself responsible for many misleading feature articles about vaping and very supportive of the current government, wrote: “This vaping ban is our trivial, mindless elite at its worst.”
In fact, the response has been so overwhelming from experts that last Monday’s expected announcement was never made – and a full week later the Department for Health remains silent on the issue.
New research released
So, the Independent British Vape Trade Association has acted.
Last week it released new research which, “reveals the importance of vaping to quitting smoking. In a huge new study of more than 6,000 smokers and ex-smokers across the country, the IBVTA found that 37% of ex-smokers and 46% of regular smokers have tried or used a vaping device to help them quit smoking.”
The IBVTA says the results show how important access to all vaping products is and that the findings, “chime with the ambition of the Government’s ‘Swap to Stop scheme’.”
“The facts highlight the role that vaping can play with the number of 18-year-olds who regularly smoked falling from 24.5% in 2021 to 19.5% in 20224, a 20% decrease in one year alone.”
The IBVTA is also set to publish a “key facts and best practice document”, highlighting how the vape industry is moving to address concerns about teen access to ecigs – something that can only be achieved in the legal sales sector and one of those unintended consequences ASH UK warned about if the black market became larger. The IBVTA is also set to detail how the ecig sector is addressing the “responsible disposal and recycling of used vape products”.
Marcus Saxton, Chair of the IBVTA
Marcus Saxton commented on the IBVTA’s national campaign, saying: “Recent negative headlines about vaping are seriously impacting people’s understanding and perceptions with a record number now believing it is as dangerous as tobacco.
“The Government itself has confirmed that vaping is 95% safer than smoking and the research that we are publishing today shows the critical role that vaping is playing in helping smokers quit. That is why we are today launching this major new campaign to challenge some of the inaccuracies and to provide reassurance around the benefits of switching to vaping whilst detailing what we as a responsible sector are doing to address recent concerns around, for example, youth access prevention and the environment.”